but avoiding of patent licenses should ultimate lower fees and increase competition among providers of both devices and content, and thus will result in greater choice and lower costs to end users, which should be of benefit
...should...
So where are all those ogg-based music stores? The ones that are underselling iTunes? Uhm...
(Yes, I know there are players, but none of them would sell to anyone but Slashdotters if they didn't also play mp3.)
Compared with the other "expenses" involved in bringing us music the use of mp3 or AAC is trivial.
You don't need money to express yourself. You don't need to get money for expressing yourself.
Maybe not... but if you spend 40 hours a week doing something totally unrelated to your art so you can survive, the quality of your art will suffer, unless you are a frenetically energetic genius.
The world needs more full-time artists, not less. And it certainly has the wealth -- and is willing to spend it -- to support them. Now if we just had a reasonable model for music distribution, that didn't create a few millionaire artists and a lot of millionare executives at everyone else's expense...
3. No method of downloading them (had to be accessed over the web).
I hope they're providing high-speed access for all the students' homes!
I was in college between 1994 and 1999... at that time.pdf was just coming into widespread use. I *hated*.pdf back then because the files were all huge and I only had dial-in access. Now they want you to use an entire e-book with no way of storing it locally?! That could be unusably slow even over broadband.
And what happens when you're cramming for a test the night before and a branch falls on your cable and takes out your Internet connection... after your school's library is already closed?
Bullshit like this gives the less tech-aware bad feelings about computers in general, which slows our progress as a society.
Option 1 (which you seem to be suggesting): Create the physical infrastructure to duplicate terabytes of data billions of times in order to allow every human being to carry everything that could possibly be relevant to him on his person.
Option 2: Store data once and build a cheap wireless network. Yes, it can work on your train ride.
"All of recorded music" in a terabyte or two? I think not. My collection takes up 170 GB and covers only a tiny fraction of recorded classical music. The idea of buying a license to all recorded music is preposterous for the foreseeable future. Good thing, too... no universal license that anyone could afford could support any significant number of artists.
He seems to have noticed the problems with the record industry's current business model, but he's not saying anything new. Next!
All I'm doing is describing behavior exhibited by voters in all communities I'm familiar with.
I'm not exempting myself at all. Politics has always been a very broad and fearsomely complicated realm. Even the most intelligent full-time politicians can't handle all the issues without a lot of help. How the heck is one voter, who probably has a job and an outside life, supposed to do it?
So we -- and again, I'm definitely including myself here; I don't think I'm superior -- respond to what's in our faces: attempts to placate or stoke our fears, vague promises or boasts of action, repetitive and simple poll-driven messages. We are led the same way an instigator leads a physical mob.
This is the reason direct democracy doesn't work. The role of voters in a good democracy (and parliamentary systems are much better than the US in this regard) is to set broad priorities and act as a check on excesses, not to blindly micromanage. If citizens believe they are independent in decision-making in all areas of politics, they are deluded.
Voters -- the real targets of these types of "security" installations, as plenty of other posts have explained -- very much act in accordance with mob psychology.
It's easy to panic them with vague, unclear insinuations in TV ads (for those of us unlucky enough to live under the US's totally ad-driven system).
It's easy to plant rumors that spread by word of mouth that almost everyone knows are false but that instill doubt.
Using "group IQ" with voters is, if anything, too generous. Hence, expensive machines completely unsuitable for their supposedly intended task which raise enormous privacy concerns.
We've gotten accustomed to thinking of backward compatibility as a good thing... and usually it is. But, with Windows, do we really want backward compatibility beyond XP SP2?
The more users (especially n00bs, Grandpa, etc.) upgrade to SP2 or later, the less spambots/zombies will be out there. It seems to me like it would actually be *responsible* for Windows developers in particular to cut off backward compatibility.
Soon, in order to do business, we'll need plugins (or self-contained executables) to deal with PDF forms, XForms and Microsoft We're-Too-Rich-To-Use-Real-XML Forms (r)(c).
How well do you think that last one will work with Linux and Mac browsers?
About well enough that anyone who asks you to fill a Microsoft form out will just say "Requires Windows."
iTunes doesn't do anything you don't ask it to. The store function can be completely turned off. As with any other player, you can use it without ever encountering DRM. And it certainly won't sell you p3ni$ p111z or erase your HD. How is it malware?
And as for the bloatware charge, iTunes doesn't have a lot of useless features; in fact, most users will complain about something that's missing (e.g. gapless playback, user-defined tags, etc.) before they'll complain of bloat. How is it bloatware?
I know, don't feed the trolls, but curiosity got the best of me.
"The same roads and infrastructure" are rapidly becoming unusable. There is simply no room for more cars. We might eke out a little more space by adopting Japanese-style 600cc minicars, but population growth would quickly eat up those savings.
Once you have designed a robust passenger rail infrastructure, adding capacity is easy, even with Manhattan-style population densities -- you can move a *lot* of people with a 16-car train ten times an hour. 16 cars * 80 pass. * 10 = 12800 passengers/hour = 3+ passengers/second. I'd like to see the road that could handle that volume and fit in the space of a double rail track.
Go to any European country and you will see that heavy rail is used in both commuter and intercity applications -- seamlessly, with brilliant scheduling. It works as advertised: it reduces car congestion in central cities to a somewhat tolerable level and it is much more enjoyable than flying.
Amtrak has never worked properly because it has never been funded properly -- not once in its sorry history. I have personally talked to many Amtrak employees who know exactly how the system should be built and run. With the massive capital investment the system deserves it could be terrific.
We are very open about massively subsidizing roads and air travel. If we subsidized passenger rail to the same level -- government construction and ownership of track and stations -- it could work just as well.
As other posters have said, regional connections should be the first to be built. Eventually, a system with lines spanning the entire east and west coasts and the Great Lakes area would be just as functional as those overseas. No, we can't build a working train through the Rockies or the desert, but that's not where the need is.
JUST BUILD IT ALREADY. Yes, I'm shouting.
Slashdot Mirror
...should...
So where are all those ogg-based music stores? The ones that are underselling iTunes? Uhm...
(Yes, I know there are players, but none of them would sell to anyone but Slashdotters if they didn't also play mp3.)
Compared with the other "expenses" involved in bringing us music the use of mp3 or AAC is trivial.
Maybe not... but if you spend 40 hours a week doing something totally unrelated to your art so you can survive, the quality of your art will suffer, unless you are a frenetically energetic genius.
The world needs more full-time artists, not less. And it certainly has the wealth -- and is willing to spend it -- to support them. Now if we just had a reasonable model for music distribution, that didn't create a few millionaire artists and a lot of millionare executives at everyone else's expense...
I hope they're providing high-speed access for all the students' homes!
I was in college between 1994 and 1999... at that time .pdf was just coming into widespread use. I *hated* .pdf back then because the files were all huge and I only had dial-in access. Now they want you to use an entire e-book with no way of storing it locally?! That could be unusably slow even over broadband.
And what happens when you're cramming for a test the night before and a branch falls on your cable and takes out your Internet connection... after your school's library is already closed?
Bullshit like this gives the less tech-aware bad feelings about computers in general, which slows our progress as a society.
3. buys text book
This is not consistent with student behavior anywhere.
In the other: John Aschroft Live!
Option 2: Store data once and build a cheap wireless network. Yes, it can work on your train ride.
He seems to have noticed the problems with the record industry's current business model, but he's not saying anything new. Next!
All I'm doing is describing behavior exhibited by voters in all communities I'm familiar with.
I'm not exempting myself at all. Politics has always been a very broad and fearsomely complicated realm. Even the most intelligent full-time politicians can't handle all the issues without a lot of help. How the heck is one voter, who probably has a job and an outside life, supposed to do it?
So we -- and again, I'm definitely including myself here; I don't think I'm superior -- respond to what's in our faces: attempts to placate or stoke our fears, vague promises or boasts of action, repetitive and simple poll-driven messages. We are led the same way an instigator leads a physical mob.
This is the reason direct democracy doesn't work. The role of voters in a good democracy (and parliamentary systems are much better than the US in this regard) is to set broad priorities and act as a check on excesses, not to blindly micromanage. If citizens believe they are independent in decision-making in all areas of politics, they are deluded.
Voters -- the real targets of these types of "security" installations, as plenty of other posts have explained -- very much act in accordance with mob psychology.
It's easy to panic them with vague, unclear insinuations in TV ads (for those of us unlucky enough to live under the US's totally ad-driven system).
It's easy to plant rumors that spread by word of mouth that almost everyone knows are false but that instill doubt.
Using "group IQ" with voters is, if anything, too generous. Hence, expensive machines completely unsuitable for their supposedly intended task which raise enormous privacy concerns.
"But the biggest innovator in our business, besides us, is Dell. Those guys are amazing."
Obligatory...
Put a tiger in the same room as a longhorn. What happen?
We've gotten accustomed to thinking of backward compatibility as a good thing... and usually it is. But, with Windows, do we really want backward compatibility beyond XP SP2?
The more users (especially n00bs, Grandpa, etc.) upgrade to SP2 or later, the less spambots/zombies will be out there. It seems to me like it would actually be *responsible* for Windows developers in particular to cut off backward compatibility.
TFA says "a browser." Doesn't specify which browser or platform.
I'll eat someone's tinfoil hat if this works plugin-free with any browser other than IE7 on Windows.
This is a security hole, as TFA sort of mentions in passing, that makes it easy for domestic-violence perpetrators and stalkers to victimize people...
... and what do we get from those responsible? "Infinitesimal problem."
Think maybe it's time to stop trusting these companies to regulate themselves?
especially for everyone not using Windows.
Soon, in order to do business, we'll need plugins (or self-contained executables) to deal with PDF forms, XForms and Microsoft We're-Too-Rich-To-Use-Real-XML Forms (r)(c).
How well do you think that last one will work with Linux and Mac browsers?
About well enough that anyone who asks you to fill a Microsoft form out will just say "Requires Windows."
iDo iToo! (iRuns off to iTunes Music Store to iWaste more iCash)
WTF, how is it going to torch the guitar after a blistering Hendrix performance?
Just wait, they'll make a more complex version that needs a Pentium 4 to control it.
mal/bloatware
OK, I'll bite...
iTunes doesn't do anything you don't ask it to. The store function can be completely turned off. As with any other player, you can use it without ever encountering DRM. And it certainly won't sell you p3ni$ p111z or erase your HD. How is it malware?
And as for the bloatware charge, iTunes doesn't have a lot of useless features; in fact, most users will complain about something that's missing (e.g. gapless playback, user-defined tags, etc.) before they'll complain of bloat. How is it bloatware?
I know, don't feed the trolls, but curiosity got the best of me.
"The same roads and infrastructure" are rapidly becoming unusable. There is simply no room for more cars. We might eke out a little more space by adopting Japanese-style 600cc minicars, but population growth would quickly eat up those savings. Once you have designed a robust passenger rail infrastructure, adding capacity is easy, even with Manhattan-style population densities -- you can move a *lot* of people with a 16-car train ten times an hour. 16 cars * 80 pass. * 10 = 12800 passengers/hour = 3+ passengers/second. I'd like to see the road that could handle that volume and fit in the space of a double rail track. Go to any European country and you will see that heavy rail is used in both commuter and intercity applications -- seamlessly, with brilliant scheduling. It works as advertised: it reduces car congestion in central cities to a somewhat tolerable level and it is much more enjoyable than flying. Amtrak has never worked properly because it has never been funded properly -- not once in its sorry history. I have personally talked to many Amtrak employees who know exactly how the system should be built and run. With the massive capital investment the system deserves it could be terrific. We are very open about massively subsidizing roads and air travel. If we subsidized passenger rail to the same level -- government construction and ownership of track and stations -- it could work just as well. As other posters have said, regional connections should be the first to be built. Eventually, a system with lines spanning the entire east and west coasts and the Great Lakes area would be just as functional as those overseas. No, we can't build a working train through the Rockies or the desert, but that's not where the need is. JUST BUILD IT ALREADY. Yes, I'm shouting.