'Regarding his 1998 crop, Schmeiser did not put forward any defence of accidental contamination. The evidence showed that the level of Roundup Ready canola in Mr. Schmeiser's 1998 fields was 95-98% (See paragraph 53 of the trial ruling). Evidence was presented indicating that such a level of purity could not occur by accidental means. On the basis of this the court found that Schmeiser had either known "or ought to have known" that he had planted Roundup Ready canola in 1998.'
'The courts at all three levels noted that the case of accidental contamination beyond the farmer's control was not under consideration but rather that Mr. Schmeiser's action of having identified, isolated and saved the Roundup-resistant seed placed the case in a different category.'
The judgment wasn't about accidental contamination. He intentionally identified and planted seeds containing the modification patented by Monsanto.
Even if the end-customer would prefer a free codec, the vendor of the content will do some cold, hard calculations. And if the non-free solution costs them less (support costs+bandwidth costs+licensing fees) they'll go with the non-free one unless they can charge the customer more for data in the free codec format in order to match their profit margins using the non-free one.
And right now the non-free solution costs the content vendors/deliverers less.
I just can't get interested in debating this stuff until Google open-sources VP8. Theora is a non-starter. It doesn't perform well and the marketplace already rejected it in enough places (i.e. virtually all portable devices) that it will never be a true competitor.
Once Google open-sources VP8 and makes it free (gratis and libre) then we'll have a real horse race. I'd love to see VP8 hardware support fast-tracked for all devices (mobile and otherwise) so we can have a competitive free solution for video.
'As for its other image quality attributes, this 'Avatar' Blu-ray is, frankly, perfect. I can find nothing at all wrong with it. The digital video picture is razor sharp and has enormous amount of fine object detail that puts the comparable DVD to shame. There is absolutely no grain or noise in any shot. Nor are there any digital processing artifacts such as artificial sharpening, Digital Noise Reduction, or compression flaws. The vibrant, vibrant, vibrant colors are stunningly beautiful. Cameron uses colors in 'Avatar' that you just don't see in other movies. The contrast range has solid blacks and excellent shadow detail. For a 2-D image, the picture has a terrific sense of depth. Really, this is the best-looking demo material yet released on Blu-ray, regardless of which aspect ratio you watch it in. I'd give it 6 stars if I could. '
I buy Blu-ray because I can rip the movies and transcode them. Including Avatar.
Try that with streaming or other DRM-laden options.
And the price premium is almost 0 for this movie. It was $19.99 at all major stores including Amazon, and you get a copy of the Blu-ray and the DVD for that price!
For the record, I didn't buy this movie. But if I did want it, I wouldn't have hesitated at all.
USB everything. No keyboard port, no mouse port. No serial ports. No slots. No floppy drive. It didn't even have Firewire, which Apple invented!
It just had USB, ethernet and audio out.
So suddenly peripheral makers started actually making USB peripherals. Serial ports, keyboards, floppy drives, mice, printers and a lot more.
Meanwhile over on the PC, PCs had USB but you didn't actually use it for anything. USB mice and keyboards didn't even work correctly in Windows 95 or 2000 (the keyboard didn't start working until late in boot so if you had a problem that required you to hit a key to type a path to find a driver you couldn't do it). Printers came after a while (parallel port connectors must have been expensive), widespread adoption of mice came a lot later and keyboards a long time after that.
Intel did invent USB, but its use on PCs was limited until after Apple had jumped in with both feet on the Mac side.
Apple was huge in pushing the floppy drive out the door, but it was really the USB memory stick that killed it if you ask me.
The contract you refer to was an employment contract, it refers to the responsibilities that the employees would have to fulfill to get paid, which is working on CoD4 and later MWs. It doesn't give them any rights to the series, those belong to Infinity Ward, and Infinity Ward is a wholly owned subsidiary of Activision, which means those belong to Activision.
I don't know about money owed, if Activision owes these people money for what they did, they should pay up. It is unlikely Activision owes these people anything for MW3 though, even if they claim so.
Remember, if you come up with something in the employ of a company, it belongs to them. MW belongs to Infinity Ward and Infinity Ward belongs to Activision.
This is incorrect. I've created unencrypted BDs and they play on all players. And even if they didn't work, nearly all BD players also play AVCHD discs (which are very similarly laid out and encrypted) and you could just make one of those instead to play the HD content you want to play.
It'd be great if you knew from where you spoke before putting out false information like this.
Israel's complaint was mostly due to a lack of a seal of approval that the iPad now has. Nothing wrong with the device, just need to show one to the approved lab and pay the fee.
Are you sure? Name another WiFi device that Israel prohibited personal imports of.
Is it not possible that the reason this WiFi device was singled out for prevention of personal importation a day or two after Apple delayed the international release is because the authorized Apple importer for Israel is well-connected within the Israeli government?
If you don't like what Valve has done with their software updates, then your options are as follows:
1. Suck it, or 2. See option 1.
Again, the fact that you can use your PC for things other than running Valve's software is not a credit to Valve at all. They don't have anything to do with that.
If you want to play games on your PC using Steam, then you have to hope Valve doesn't make a change to their EULA that you don't like. Same as with PS3.
There is no Sony versus Valve here. If Valve has an orange, than Sony has an orange. If Sony has a hammer then Valve has a hammer.
I'm not complaining about either of them. I'm just pointing out they are both the same. If one says Valve needs that clause as part of the "just work" paradigm, does Sony not also? They have 1M clients connecting too.
I don't see how that's Sony's apples and Valve's oranges. You can say PC versus PS3 is apples and oranges by your argument.
But saying PS3 versus Steam is not. With both, if you refuse to update, you (at best) can continue to play the games you already bought but no future games.
You are saying that at least if you delete Steam you can continue to use the PC for other stuff. That's true, but that's not "Valve's oranges", Valve isn't even involved with the PC after you delete Steam!
I respect that you don't buy hardware you don't really have full control of. But that's not the perfect solution for everyone. Some of us want to play the games that come on these consoles and so we have to decide whether caving on principles is worth enjoying the games. You have to take the bad with the good, even though we might all wish it were not so.
Steam and your Subscription(s) require the automatic download and installation of software and other content and updates onto your computer ("Steam Software"). You may not use Steam Software for any purpose other than the permitted access to Steam and your Subscriptions. You understand that for reasons that include, without limitation, system security, stability, and multiplayer interoperability, Steam may need to automatically update, pre-load, create new versions or otherwise enhance the Steam Software and accordingly, the system requirements to use the Steam Software may change over time. You understand that neither this Agreement nor the terms associated with a particular Subscription entitles you to future updates, new versions or other enhancements of the Steam Software associated with a particular Subscription although Valve may choose to provide such updates, etc. in its sole discretion.
Face it, all EULAs are designed so that the seller (ha, I mean licensor of course!) can screw you all they want. You just have to hope they don't do it.
The design of a CPU includes the way it interfaces to the motherboard. If you make a new CPU on the same interface (bus), you don't get full performance. And you can't optimize power either. And it buys you very little to not pair the two up. Very few people upgrade their CPU, they usually buy a CPU with the motherboard and don't change it until they get a new motherboard.
And heck, few people even buy their own motherboard anyway! People who build their own systems don't realize how few people do so now. It can't be over 20% of the market worldwide, and a lot less than that in the US.
If I were him, I'd put links indicating what Apple did wrong right in the splash/main screen of the app when I re-submit it. Then see if Apple dares to reject it again or will instead swallow their pride and approve it. I'd really hope for the latter, but either would help raise awareness of how problematic Apple's policies are.
I don't think it does ad hoc networking. If there are no 5.8GHz base stations, then the iPad won't use 5.8GHz Wi-Fi. If there are 5.8GHz base stations, then it isn't really the iPad that's creating the problem, is it?
Apple doesn't sell their own products directly in Israel, they have a distributor there. Every iPad brought in represents a lost sale for them. Sounds like they're angry about not getting the device quickly enough and losing early sales.
I'd say you're usually paying more than a little bit.
But again, you're about a "my vendor sucks" problem, not a responsible disclosure problem. Irresponsible or no disclosure won't change the problem that your vendor sucks and you now know you are relying on a product with known security flaws.
None of those problems listed seem to be with responsible disclosure. It's your job to responsibly disclose. And you should protect their secret for a while. After that, it's not really your problem if they won't or can't act.
I agree there are also issues here with relying on code that you now know has security issues. But those aren't anything to do with responsible disclosure either. If you posted it to the internet you'd still have issues relying on them. Same as if you didn't tell anyone.
Look at it this way, when you tell a vendor what's wrong and try to help them fix it, you're really doing it to help yourself. Your doing it because you believe it will be less work than changing your entire system to not rely on their code.
As an aside, I don't get a big rush when I find a problem in someone else's code. Maybe I'm just old and jaded now, but I'm just trying to get everything to work well, finding that someone else didn't do their job doesn't usually make my situation any better (as you indicate here), so I don't relish it.
Yes, the iPhone and iPod Touch mattered. But if Google had chosen Theora and not H.264 (not sure why it's an either/or, but you presupposed this) then YouTube would be a bit player in the mobile market right now because no mobile device could play it efficiently, because there is no Theora support in mobile chips right now.
YouTube's competitors were already supporting H.264 and thus they could work on mobile devices, and Google could have lost the mobile market space to them if they didn't move to cover this weakness.
To me it's strange to think mobile players will move to adding Theora hardware support just as a "backup plan". Transistors aren't free. There's a lot of codecs they already don't support that would bring a lot more perceived value to the customer before they'd add Theora.
Where space and power matters most (pocketable devices), I'm just not entranced by support for more codecs that aren't efficient.
Some day it'll be reasonable for the device in your pocket to play video in any format you find it in. But for now, I think I'd rather the effort were concentrated on maxing out the efficiency (bits and power) of the codecs that are already in wide use.
Slashdot Mirror
'Regarding his 1998 crop, Schmeiser did not put forward any defence of accidental contamination. The evidence showed that the level of Roundup Ready canola in Mr. Schmeiser's 1998 fields was 95-98% (See paragraph 53 of the trial ruling). Evidence was presented indicating that such a level of purity could not occur by accidental means. On the basis of this the court found that Schmeiser had either known "or ought to have known" that he had planted Roundup Ready canola in 1998.'
'The courts at all three levels noted that the case of accidental contamination beyond the farmer's control was not under consideration but rather that Mr. Schmeiser's action of having identified, isolated and saved the Roundup-resistant seed placed the case in a different category.'
The judgment wasn't about accidental contamination. He intentionally identified and planted seeds containing the modification patented by Monsanto.
Even if the end-customer would prefer a free codec, the vendor of the content will do some cold, hard calculations. And if the non-free solution costs them less (support costs+bandwidth costs+licensing fees) they'll go with the non-free one unless they can charge the customer more for data in the free codec format in order to match their profit margins using the non-free one.
And right now the non-free solution costs the content vendors/deliverers less.
That's why the quality matters.
I just can't get interested in debating this stuff until Google open-sources VP8. Theora is a non-starter. It doesn't perform well and the marketplace already rejected it in enough places (i.e. virtually all portable devices) that it will never be a true competitor.
Once Google open-sources VP8 and makes it free (gratis and libre) then we'll have a real horse race. I'd love to see VP8 hardware support fast-tracked for all devices (mobile and otherwise) so we can have a competitive free solution for video.
http://bluray.highdefdigest.com/2915/avatar.html
'As for its other image quality attributes, this 'Avatar' Blu-ray is, frankly, perfect. I can find nothing at all wrong with it. The digital video picture is razor sharp and has enormous amount of fine object detail that puts the comparable DVD to shame. There is absolutely no grain or noise in any shot. Nor are there any digital processing artifacts such as artificial sharpening, Digital Noise Reduction, or compression flaws. The vibrant, vibrant, vibrant colors are stunningly beautiful. Cameron uses colors in 'Avatar' that you just don't see in other movies. The contrast range has solid blacks and excellent shadow detail. For a 2-D image, the picture has a terrific sense of depth. Really, this is the best-looking demo material yet released on Blu-ray, regardless of which aspect ratio you watch it in. I'd give it 6 stars if I could. '
I buy Blu-ray because I can rip the movies and transcode them. Including Avatar.
Try that with streaming or other DRM-laden options.
And the price premium is almost 0 for this movie. It was $19.99 at all major stores including Amazon, and you get a copy of the Blu-ray and the DVD for that price!
For the record, I didn't buy this movie. But if I did want it, I wouldn't have hesitated at all.
USB everything. No keyboard port, no mouse port. No serial ports. No slots. No floppy drive. It didn't even have Firewire, which Apple invented!
It just had USB, ethernet and audio out.
So suddenly peripheral makers started actually making USB peripherals. Serial ports, keyboards, floppy drives, mice, printers and a lot more.
Meanwhile over on the PC, PCs had USB but you didn't actually use it for anything. USB mice and keyboards didn't even work correctly in Windows 95 or 2000 (the keyboard didn't start working until late in boot so if you had a problem that required you to hit a key to type a path to find a driver you couldn't do it). Printers came after a while (parallel port connectors must have been expensive), widespread adoption of mice came a lot later and keyboards a long time after that.
Intel did invent USB, but its use on PCs was limited until after Apple had jumped in with both feet on the Mac side.
Apple was huge in pushing the floppy drive out the door, but it was really the USB memory stick that killed it if you ask me.
The contract you refer to was an employment contract, it refers to the responsibilities that the employees would have to fulfill to get paid, which is working on CoD4 and later MWs. It doesn't give them any rights to the series, those belong to Infinity Ward, and Infinity Ward is a wholly owned subsidiary of Activision, which means those belong to Activision.
I don't know about money owed, if Activision owes these people money for what they did, they should pay up. It is unlikely Activision owes these people anything for MW3 though, even if they claim so.
Remember, if you come up with something in the employ of a company, it belongs to them. MW belongs to Infinity Ward and Infinity Ward belongs to Activision.
This is incorrect. I've created unencrypted BDs and they play on all players. And even if they didn't work, nearly all BD players also play AVCHD discs (which are very similarly laid out and encrypted) and you could just make one of those instead to play the HD content you want to play.
It'd be great if you knew from where you spoke before putting out false information like this.
Israel's complaint was mostly due to a lack of a seal of approval that the iPad now has. Nothing wrong with the device, just need to show one to the approved lab and pay the fee.
Are you sure? Name another WiFi device that Israel prohibited personal imports of.
Is it not possible that the reason this WiFi device was singled out for prevention of personal importation a day or two after Apple delayed the international release is because the authorized Apple importer for Israel is well-connected within the Israeli government?
Even though mp3 is patent encumbered. This project is along those same lines.
It's not Valve's oranges.
If you don't like what Valve has done with their software updates, then your options are as follows:
1. Suck it, or
2. See option 1.
Again, the fact that you can use your PC for things other than running Valve's software is not a credit to Valve at all. They don't have anything to do with that.
If you want to play games on your PC using Steam, then you have to hope Valve doesn't make a change to their EULA that you don't like. Same as with PS3.
There is no Sony versus Valve here. If Valve has an orange, than Sony has an orange. If Sony has a hammer then Valve has a hammer.
I'm not complaining about either of them. I'm just pointing out they are both the same. If one says Valve needs that clause as part of the "just work" paradigm, does Sony not also? They have 1M clients connecting too.
I don't see how that's Sony's apples and Valve's oranges. You can say PC versus PS3 is apples and oranges by your argument.
But saying PS3 versus Steam is not. With both, if you refuse to update, you (at best) can continue to play the games you already bought but no future games.
You are saying that at least if you delete Steam you can continue to use the PC for other stuff. That's true, but that's not "Valve's oranges", Valve isn't even involved with the PC after you delete Steam!
I respect that you don't buy hardware you don't really have full control of. But that's not the perfect solution for everyone. Some of us want to play the games that come on these consoles and so we have to decide whether caving on principles is worth enjoying the games. You have to take the bad with the good, even though we might all wish it were not so.
Not sure why Sony is taking the heat for it more than others. Maybe it's because the good guys like Valve wouldn't pull this crap on us!
http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/
2.A. License Terms.
Face it, all EULAs are designed so that the seller (ha, I mean licensor of course!) can screw you all they want. You just have to hope they don't do it.
The design of a CPU includes the way it interfaces to the motherboard. If you make a new CPU on the same interface (bus), you don't get full performance. And you can't optimize power either. And it buys you very little to not pair the two up. Very few people upgrade their CPU, they usually buy a CPU with the motherboard and don't change it until they get a new motherboard.
And heck, few people even buy their own motherboard anyway! People who build their own systems don't realize how few people do so now. It can't be over 20% of the market worldwide, and a lot less than that in the US.
It's an OS function.
Firefox should have nothing to do with it. The browser should play whatever the OS can support.
This is like Firefox saying they now support Dvorak keyboards.
If I were him, I'd put links indicating what Apple did wrong right in the splash/main screen of the app when I re-submit it. Then see if Apple dares to reject it again or will instead swallow their pride and approve it. I'd really hope for the latter, but either would help raise awareness of how problematic Apple's policies are.
I don't think it does ad hoc networking. If there are no 5.8GHz base stations, then the iPad won't use 5.8GHz Wi-Fi. If there are 5.8GHz base stations, then it isn't really the iPad that's creating the problem, is it?
Apple doesn't sell their own products directly in Israel, they have a distributor there. Every iPad brought in represents a lost sale for them. Sounds like they're angry about not getting the device quickly enough and losing early sales.
http://www.apple.com/il/buy/
You see what it took to kill IE6. MS hasn't supported it for what, 2 years and it's finally now about to die?
Not supporting this video codec is unlikely to kill IE.
I'd say you're usually paying more than a little bit.
But again, you're about a "my vendor sucks" problem, not a responsible disclosure problem. Irresponsible or no disclosure won't change the problem that your vendor sucks and you now know you are relying on a product with known security flaws.
Or perhaps this is some kind of steganographic secret message you are passing onto one of your field agents?
Your response has nothing at all to do with the situation here.
None of those problems listed seem to be with responsible disclosure. It's your job to responsibly disclose. And you should protect their secret for a while. After that, it's not really your problem if they won't or can't act.
I agree there are also issues here with relying on code that you now know has security issues. But those aren't anything to do with responsible disclosure either. If you posted it to the internet you'd still have issues relying on them. Same as if you didn't tell anyone.
Look at it this way, when you tell a vendor what's wrong and try to help them fix it, you're really doing it to help yourself. Your doing it because you believe it will be less work than changing your entire system to not rely on their code.
As an aside, I don't get a big rush when I find a problem in someone else's code. Maybe I'm just old and jaded now, but I'm just trying to get everything to work well, finding that someone else didn't do their job doesn't usually make my situation any better (as you indicate here), so I don't relish it.
Yes, the iPhone and iPod Touch mattered. But if Google had chosen Theora and not H.264 (not sure why it's an either/or, but you presupposed this) then YouTube would be a bit player in the mobile market right now because no mobile device could play it efficiently, because there is no Theora support in mobile chips right now.
YouTube's competitors were already supporting H.264 and thus they could work on mobile devices, and Google could have lost the mobile market space to them if they didn't move to cover this weakness.
To me it's strange to think mobile players will move to adding Theora hardware support just as a "backup plan". Transistors aren't free. There's a lot of codecs they already don't support that would bring a lot more perceived value to the customer before they'd add Theora.
Where space and power matters most (pocketable devices), I'm just not entranced by support for more codecs that aren't efficient.
Some day it'll be reasonable for the device in your pocket to play video in any format you find it in. But for now, I think I'd rather the effort were concentrated on maxing out the efficiency (bits and power) of the codecs that are already in wide use.