You don't have to prove that you did so by mistake (though it would be useful if you could). THEY have to prove that you did so purposely. You don't have to prove innocence; they have to prove guilt.
Re:more proof the RIAA/MPAA are insane
on
Death By DMCA
·
· Score: 1
I would, but now that they're operating in four countries instead of just one, I wouldn't know where to email them.;)
I think it's okay to complain about the companies AND copyright law. Who is so gullible as to believe that the companies with the most to lose/gain from copyright laws have nothing to do with the laws being passed? I'm pretty sure it wasn't in the interest of the general public to extend copyright durations, but it WAS in the interest of the megacompanies who own the rights to works that would have become public domain. Especially Disney. Every time Mickey Mouse comes close to becoming public domain, boom, they extend the duration of copyrights. I highly doubt that is coincidence.
I'm not one of those information-wants-to-be-free people. Information doesn't want jack, and it's idiocy to anthropomorphize it. But copyright durations have grown to insane lengths. I don't even really mind those long durations that much, if it's the original creator holding the rights. I think the durations should be trimmed to 15 or 20 years if the rights have left the original creator, however. In other words, if Prince writes a new tune, he can keep those rights for 100 years or whatever the duration is currently. But if he sells those rights to anyone else, truncate the duration to 15 or 20 years, as originally intended.
Copyright was created to help works reach the public domain and enhance our freely available cultural heritage; it was not created to help megacorporations milk the work of artists for centuries at the expense of public accessibility.
A torrent file is basically an "assembly instruction manual" for data file(s). Just as it's not illegal to distribute instructions for building a bomb or a gun, it is also not illegal to distribute instructions on how to create a data file. Actually building (or using) a bomb might or might not be illegal, but merely delivering the instructions on how to build it is definitely not illegal (at least in the U.S., so far). Just so with torrents: hosting the torrent files, distributing them, downloading them, that's all legal. Actually using the torrent file to "build" the data file(s) it represents is what is illegal, if the file(s) being (re)built are copyrighted.
If you want to start a website that does nothing but provide instructions on how to build bombs, you can do it. Even if every single person who downloads those instructions uses them to build a bomb and tries to blow up a packed church on Sunday.
The technology exists to spy quite extensively on people now. Not just their phone calls, but inside their bedrooms, in their cars, their movements during the day, pretty much everything. Once you give up a chunk of privacy here and a chunk there, it won't be long until we're living in a completely monitored society. Now, I'm no major lawbreaker or anything; they'd find my phone calls boring, and I like the missionary position when I have sex, which is boring too. But do I really want strangers hearing my conversations, or watching when I have sex, or knowing exactly when I leave the house, and where I'm going, and when I'll be back? Not really. Would we be safer if the government knew absolutely everything about everyone? Well, I'd be safer from terrorists, perhaps, yes. But I wouldn't feel safe from the government. If you trade your liberty for security, you deserve neither liberty nor security. If the terrorists succeed in turning our own government into a giant spying apparatus aimed at our own citizens, then it is safe to say that the terrorists have won.
They have fought the war on drugs with skill? Surely you jest. After spending a trillion dollars since the beginning of the war on drugs, all drugs are more available than they were before the war began, and potency is, if anything, improved. If there is a war on piracy, and it is fought as skillfully as the war on drugs, then in 30 years or so we'll have a few more million people to clothe and feed and shelter in prison, we'll be out another trillion dollars, and piracy will have increased.
Actually, I had an idea related to this, and that is, have an extra "inefficiency tax" on gasoline based on the fuel efficiency of the car, and implement it a little at a time, until in 10 years it ends up something like: less than 20 mpg pay an extra buck on gas, 21-30 mpg pay an extra 75 cents, 31-40 mpg pay an extra 50 cents, 41-50 mpg pay an extra 25 cents per gallon, 51-60 mpg no tax, 61+ mpg you get a DISCOUNT of 25 cents per gallon of gas (paid for by the rich folks driving their gigantic 10 mpg gas hogs). All remaining money in this tax fund after accounting for the price discount to the super efficient folks then goes to improving existing fuel technology and developing better.
This would provide an additional incentive for people to use less gas, and to use more efficient cars. You'd still have the freedom, should you wish to expend your wealth doing it, to drive any gas guzzler you want, of course, but doing so would at the same time help finance rewarding people who push the limits of efficiency and help pay for development of even greater efficiency.
Oral sex was also considered abnormal (inhuman, disgusting, yada yada) once upon a time. I hope we don't have to go back to pre-BJ days, because that would suck. Or not suck, I guess. If you go back far enough, the norm was to throw a woman down and jump her, whether she was willing or not, and raping young boys in conquered cities was not at all abnormal. Depends on the society, where they draw moral lines as relates to sexuality. Personally, as long as everyone involved is consensual, and nobody involved is prepubescent, and everyone's happy after they're done with their business, then I figure it ain't up to me to try to overlay MY sexual values on people who are happy without my interference.
Liberals are more of the 'do whatever you want as long as there are no children involved and everyone consents' whereas conservatives tend to be more of the 'do it our way or it's wrong and you need to be punished, because our morals > yours anytime the two aren't aligned'.
Like I said, it's not always true, but in general it is. Sure, there are exceptions, but by and large, I'd guess in 90 percent of cases, the local populace is happy with our troops (and their money), especially in cases where the base is new enough that they remember what their lives were like economically before our base was there.
I've lived in some of those countries that you mentioned, near or on U.S. military bases. You were apparently seeming to imply that our bases are not wanted in those countries. From experience, I can say that you are wrong about that. Everywhere there is a U.S. base, there are huge economic benefits for the surrounding area. The people NEAR the bases generally greatly wish those bases to remain where they are, because the bases positively impact their quality of life. If you go ask a mountain farm family in eastern Turkey whether they would like the airbase at Incirlik gone, they will probably say yes. However, if you ask the same question of a Turkish family living near Incirlik, 9 times out of 10 you will get the opposite reaction: "Hell no, we don't want them to leave!" That's not *always* the case, but it is true more often than not, that our bases are desired, at least by the majority of those living near enough to them to reap the economic benefits. By and large, once people get to know us (by getting to know our troops when they're not on duty), they like us. Those who never meet us never see us as actual people, so of course they are negatively biased.
The problem is, if everyone except the child pornographers do that, then you have handed them a more substantial percentage of Freenet than they might otherwise have. It's better to join Freenet and contribute non child pornography to it than it is to simply ignore it and pretend it doesn't exist. It's sort of like voting with your data and your preferences. If you don't like politicians and therefore do not participate in a democracy, you certainly can't effect any change, even changes you believe in. I'm not saying you can eradicate the child porn by being a Freenet node, but what you CAN do is decrease the percentage of child porn data that exists on Freenet as compared to the total overall data. Only by participating in a non child porn way can you hope to effect such change. You do have to accept the evil with the good when it comes to absolute freedom, but you have the power to make the AMOUNT of good greater in proportion to the amount of evil. Or you can stay disconnected and thereby help increase the proportion of evil.
Eh? Some countries in Africa have already risen up to overthrow their governments. When you mistreat a majority of your population, that's always a risk. We'd be wise to learn that.
And do I want to be rich? Well, 'rich' is a subjective and relative term. What people usually mean by it is, 'have a lot more than their neighbors' or 'have a lot more than the common man'. I want to live comfortably, and I do, and that's vastly more important to me than how I'm doing in comparison to someone else. In fact, I think I'd find it preferable if everyone lived as comfortably as I do, rather than that I have vastly more than my neighbors or vastly more than the common man. I don't need to stand on others to prop myself up. I'd rather we all stand together.
It will be a sad day when all social programs are gone. That'll mean no public roadways, no public education, no public anything. In that type of society, the rich get richer and more powerful, and the poor don't have a chance to better their lives, because they can't afford an education and can't afford to pay the tolls on all the private roads to get to work. The phrase 'everyone is created equal', meaning everyone has equal opportunity, however much of its meaning has already been lost, would be completely meaningless then. Of course, we won't ever get to that point, because when things get that bad, the poor outnumber the rich, and they rise up, kill all the rich, and start over. It's happened many times in the past. I would have thought we were past that, but perhaps not.
Well, I'm not really impressed with G's record, security-wise. Does anyone feel safer? There was also a study done to figure out the net overall real cost of invading Iraq, and that cost was between 1 and 2 trillion dollars (depending on how conservative you went in this area or that). I'm thinking that for 1 or 2 trillion dollars, there might have been better ways to beef up our security than smacking a hornet's nest of potential terrorists. I mean, did we even have our politicians sit down and say, 'Hey guys, yeah, we can invade Iraq, and maybe Saddam has some WMDs (and maybe he doesn't), but the cost, well, might be a couple trillion bucks. Is that the BEST way to improve national security for that much money?' For a two trillion dollar investment, I want to get more out of it than a bunch of pissed off Muslims, personally. But hey, as long as G thought that was the best way to use that much money to improve national security, well, that's what really matters. *cough*
To put that amount in perspective, it would've been cheaper to give every single Iraqi man, woman and child a bit over $70,000 in cash, which would allow pretty much every family there to live in relative comfort for the rest of their lives. Just airlift in the money, in singles, and dump it out the hatch. (Not sure how many cargo planes it'd take to hold two trillion dollars in singles, but I bet it'd be pretty many!) They'd be so busy running around amassing (our) wealth that there'd be no time for planting bombs or killing us or each other. In fact, after that, why would they WANT to kill us?
Quote: "On the surface, it seems he was intent on rubbing out every trace of the data, so he must have known it was sensitive and unique."
That same argument could be used in any case involving data that is encrypted. Yet, the act of encryption does not imbue the data encrypted with any other qualities. Nothing forbids one from encrypting *everything*, no matter how mundane. It's not illegal or even immoral to be paranoid. And does encrypting (or deleting) data transform that data from mundane to sensitive and unique? Of course not. I don't see how it can be proved that data that no longer exists was too sensitive to delete. Proving anything at all about something that doesn't exist seems to be impossible, just on the basis of logic. Of course, that hasn't stopped religions from becoming widespread.
The problem with a mission to Mars is that every such project inevitably makes the underlying assumption that the people you send there must also come back. If the people you send there STAY there, then you don't need to send along all the stuff you need to return them (which dramatically complicates everything). Instead of a return vehicle and fuel, you send what they need to stay there. And I believe we have the technology to eliminate the radiation threat on the journey there: shielding, in whatever strength and thickness is necessary.
Now you're going to ask, who in their right mind would sign up for a one-way journey to Mars? I would, for sure, as long as I was reasonably convinced that I'd be given enough tools to maximize my odds of surviving a fair amount of time, and some assurance that I wouldn't be totally abandoned (e.g., there would be future supply missions at the very least). I'm sure I'm not the only one willing to risk my life and ultimately devote the rest of my life to such an achievement for humanity.
The amount of science a few people can do on Mars in a year or two is dwarfed by the amount of science one person can do who lives out the rest of his life there. And once you have one person dug in permanently, adding more people becomes easier. Newer people could arrive with their apartments already carved out for them, the electricity and ventilation already wired and piped in preparation for their arrival, additional hydroponics to support them already grown with new crops on the way. Forget about the idea of bringing people or samples back. Once you toss that plan and embrace the idea that anyone you send is there to stay, things get easier in many ways. For example, instead of sending enough fuel and a craft to return a sample, just send the equipment needed to analyze that sample to Mars and let the person or persons living there analyze it and send back the data. They can then use that equipment to analyze MANY samples instead of just one. Instead of sending heavily shielded return craft and fuel to bring people back, send parts and equipment necessary to keep the people there alive.
Instead of considering a trip to Mars an 'exploration mission', consider it a 'colonization mission'. That is, I think, the key to success. Sending people there and bringing them back over and over is stupidly wasteful. I don't even really see a lot of point in that. I do see a point in sending colonists, however.
Ultimately, the artists have most of the power here. They just don't realize that, collectively, they could charge anything they want for their work, if they act as a unified whole (think: the Major League Baseball Players Union).
Let's say all artists get together and say that they are going to charge 5 bucks a song, and they hold the line on that, *and* do not let their masters go *anywhere* until they have presold 1 million copies. That is, until they have been paid 5 million bucks, nobody anywhere gets that song in anything higher than 64kbps mp3 format. Since at that point, the song only exists in one place in lossless format, the public (as a whole) then has two options: 1) forget the song and nobody ever gets it; or 2) fork over the bucks. That's it, those two choices. No going to a P2P site and downloading it, no getting a friend to buy it and making a copy, all those choices gone, out the window.
Now think if every artist did this. Society would then collectively have those same two options. Forget any new music, or start forking over the money, and the product isn't released in any quality format UNTIL the money's been paid. E.g., you pay for the goods, and you pay first BEFORE you get the goods (other than 64kbps mp3s). In the past it's been, release a product and see how many you sell. Digital duplication could force artists into a new model: don't release a product (other than low quality trial format) until there's enough guarnateed money to make it worthwhile to allow society to have access to it. It's not like society could argue that point -- the creators have the control.
Take it a step farther. Artists decide to only sell their new music (or books, paintings, whatever) to ONE customer, for, say, $100k per song (book, whatever), and those who buy it are not authorized to release it, duplicate it, sell it, just to listen to it (read it, view it, whatever) for their own pleasure. New music suddenly attains scarcity value, and the rich (being the only ones who can really afford new music) become the ones who support what is left of the music industry, by establishing personal collections. Much like wealthy patrons of the past supporting and contracting sculptors or painters, before copyrights existed, for personal works. In this case, the public as a whole is left out of the picture entirely, except for the wealthy elite, who have their own personal private collections which they might trade among themselves. And really, once they've paid that much for something, why would they *want* to lower its value by reducing its scarcity? Rich people like rare stuff. If all musicians wanted to act cohesively, they could simply revert back to the ways of old, and have the wealthy of society be the benefactors, and sole beneficiaries of their work. Again, the public would have no choice in this matter.
If the artists act as a cohesive collective whole (which may not and probably will not ever happen, however possible it is), then really nobody has power equal to theirs, in terms of control over their products. Not the RIAA, not the public, not anybody. He who can destroy a thing has complete power over that thing, and when an artistic item exists in only one form (e.g. before it is digitally mass duplicated), it is the artist who created it who has that ultimate power.
If artists become so beleagured due to digitization and mass duplication of their works, they might just become such a cohesive whole, at which time they can decide their own destiny, regardless of what the RIAA or the general public thinks or wants. It would be interesting to see it get to the point where that happens. Unfortunately, I'm not one of the wealthy, so I might have to make due with stuff that's already available, and nothing new, but I'd still have the ability to *become* one of the wealthy benefactors/beneficiaries at some point and then partake in new books/songs/whatevers, and trade with other members of the wealthy elite.
How about they run it *exactly* as a library, but with a digital spin. Let's say that at any one time, there are 3 people wanting to search the book, "The Mote in God's Eye" by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. Sooo...Google buys three copies of this book, and while those three users are using those three licenses, no one else can. And when they are done (they click "done" somewhere, or the book autmatically digitally disappears or becomes unuseable thanks to some DRM), then those copies go back into "circulation".
Now repeat this process for every book in existence. The more popular books they will need to buy perhaps 100,000 licenses for, to supply the whole world. The less popular books, 1 or 2 copies, of course.
This is exactly the premise that libraries operate under, so why not?
Note that this same checkin/checkout procedure, if the DRM were strong enough, could also be done for songs, or movies. How many people are, right now, watching the Disney version of Aladdin? 100? Okay then, they buy 100 copies and that supplies the world.
The difference between this potential digital superlibrary and normal libraries is convenience and efficiency. A normal library serves a small area. Geography becomes irrelevant when the data is digital. And efficiency? This would be close to 100 percent efficient utilization of every license purchased by the library, vastly more efficient than current libraries. More than a thousand times as efficient.
Google could even automate new license acquisition. For example, a new Stephen King book comes out. A person requests it. There is no license available, so Google auto-buys a license from wherever (Amazon, Stephen King himself, whatever). Another person requests it, Google autobuys another. Eventually enough licenses have been purchased that that number handles the peak useage on those licenses, and no license for that particular work need ever be purchased again, because there's now enough to satify the demands of the world in perpetuity.
And more on efficiency. You buy a license for a Madonna song, say, from iTunes. While you are listening to that song, you wonder how many other people in the world are also, at that very same instant, listening to that song. As long as licenses are easy to acquire from the superlibrary and as long as they are returned when they are not in use, so *others* can use them, then license useage becomes massively efficient. If you have purchased from iTunes the license to 5,000 songs, and spent 5 grand doing it, how many of those songs are you listening to AT ANY ONE TIME? One. So your license efficiency is 1/5000. While you are listening to one song, the licenses for the other 4,999 are being WASTED. A superlibrary would not have any such waste.
The technology is there to do this. I'm not sure of the legality of transferring licenses back and forth over a network, but assuming that hurdle could be overcome, there is nothing at all unethical about such a superlibrary. I am convinced that, sooner or later, such will arise, whether it's Google that does it, or some government, or some multi-national non-profit group.
Copyright is just law that protects a creator's ability to make a living creating. I'm not sure abolishing that would be a sociologically good thing. The average creator (say, a low-to-mid-level writer, writes good stuff, but not great, has a small audience, never hits any top 10 lists) makes maybe 40k or 50k a year. You take that 40k or 50k away and he's not just giving up a new gold-plated pool every third year, he gives up eating, and living with a roof over his head, and paying his children's tuition, and medical care, and insurance.
These people in this tier, who are *by far* the majority of creative people, without being able to sell their creative works then get other jobs. Heck, flipping burgers at Mickey D's at least pays a guaranteed check.
Would some people keep creating, for free? Sure, absolutely. Not nearly as many though because for the common man (and most creators *are* 'the common man'), paying the bills is important, and if Job A can't do that but Job B can, they do Job B. You'd still have amateurs producing okay stuff, and you'd occasionally have the mega-genius in his creative field come along, but the everyday workmen (who produce the bulk of all music and writing), without copyrights and laws to protect their income, would disappear.
I've said this before. A common counter-argument is that in earlier times, people still created stuff without copyright. Which is true. But take any century prior to copyrights and compare it to any century since copyrights, and the amount of creative works that appeared are miniscule in comparison. Plato, Aristotle, they had rich benefactors. Michaelangelo, he got paid for his work, and royally well too. But how many of the 'common man' creators were there in the 15th or 16th centuries? Not many. Very few in fact.
The few creators there were in earlier times, say the 16th century and prior, had wealthy patrons, were wealthy themselves, were recognized masters in their field, or lived in abject poverty and were recognized for their work posthumously. Is that what we want to go back to? A life with perhaps 5 percent of the creative works produced each year compared to what is produced each year now?
Personally, I want a creatively rich world, where creating artistic works of any type is a valued human endeavor. Valued in the sense that those who can do it, and do do it are able to make a decent living. I'd rather have 10,000 creative works which cost money, among which are 20 true creative jewels than only 1 jewel -- even if that 1 jewel of creativity is free.
On the other hand, because we *have* valued creativity, and have done so for some time now, I suppose it's possible that we will reach a point where there is simply 'enough' available content, and as a whole the human race will stop caring about (e.g. valuing) NEW creative content. When that happens, then yes, it will be very close to time to abolish copyright laws and protections. Nothing says the human race isn't ultimately destined for creative stagnation. Perhaps we are.
Slashdot Mirror
You don't have to prove that you did so by mistake (though it would be useful if you could). THEY have to prove that you did so purposely. You don't have to prove innocence; they have to prove guilt.
I would, but now that they're operating in four countries instead of just one, I wouldn't know where to email them. ;)
I think it's okay to complain about the companies AND copyright law. Who is so gullible as to believe that the companies with the most to lose/gain from copyright laws have nothing to do with the laws being passed? I'm pretty sure it wasn't in the interest of the general public to extend copyright durations, but it WAS in the interest of the megacompanies who own the rights to works that would have become public domain. Especially Disney. Every time Mickey Mouse comes close to becoming public domain, boom, they extend the duration of copyrights. I highly doubt that is coincidence.
I'm not one of those information-wants-to-be-free people. Information doesn't want jack, and it's idiocy to anthropomorphize it. But copyright durations have grown to insane lengths. I don't even really mind those long durations that much, if it's the original creator holding the rights. I think the durations should be trimmed to 15 or 20 years if the rights have left the original creator, however. In other words, if Prince writes a new tune, he can keep those rights for 100 years or whatever the duration is currently. But if he sells those rights to anyone else, truncate the duration to 15 or 20 years, as originally intended.
Copyright was created to help works reach the public domain and enhance our freely available cultural heritage; it was not created to help megacorporations milk the work of artists for centuries at the expense of public accessibility.
A torrent file is basically an "assembly instruction manual" for data file(s). Just as it's not illegal to distribute instructions for building a bomb or a gun, it is also not illegal to distribute instructions on how to create a data file. Actually building (or using) a bomb might or might not be illegal, but merely delivering the instructions on how to build it is definitely not illegal (at least in the U.S., so far). Just so with torrents: hosting the torrent files, distributing them, downloading them, that's all legal. Actually using the torrent file to "build" the data file(s) it represents is what is illegal, if the file(s) being (re)built are copyrighted.
If you want to start a website that does nothing but provide instructions on how to build bombs, you can do it. Even if every single person who downloads those instructions uses them to build a bomb and tries to blow up a packed church on Sunday.
The technology exists to spy quite extensively on people now. Not just their phone calls, but inside their bedrooms, in their cars, their movements during the day, pretty much everything. Once you give up a chunk of privacy here and a chunk there, it won't be long until we're living in a completely monitored society. Now, I'm no major lawbreaker or anything; they'd find my phone calls boring, and I like the missionary position when I have sex, which is boring too. But do I really want strangers hearing my conversations, or watching when I have sex, or knowing exactly when I leave the house, and where I'm going, and when I'll be back? Not really. Would we be safer if the government knew absolutely everything about everyone? Well, I'd be safer from terrorists, perhaps, yes. But I wouldn't feel safe from the government. If you trade your liberty for security, you deserve neither liberty nor security. If the terrorists succeed in turning our own government into a giant spying apparatus aimed at our own citizens, then it is safe to say that the terrorists have won.
They have fought the war on drugs with skill? Surely you jest. After spending a trillion dollars since the beginning of the war on drugs, all drugs are more available than they were before the war began, and potency is, if anything, improved. If there is a war on piracy, and it is fought as skillfully as the war on drugs, then in 30 years or so we'll have a few more million people to clothe and feed and shelter in prison, we'll be out another trillion dollars, and piracy will have increased.
And with a really big single dish we could see planets that aren't bright enough to be seen? ;)
Check out Tunebite, I believe it works with iTunes, as well as other services.
Actually, I had an idea related to this, and that is, have an extra "inefficiency tax" on gasoline based on the fuel efficiency of the car, and implement it a little at a time, until in 10 years it ends up something like: less than 20 mpg pay an extra buck on gas, 21-30 mpg pay an extra 75 cents, 31-40 mpg pay an extra 50 cents, 41-50 mpg pay an extra 25 cents per gallon, 51-60 mpg no tax, 61+ mpg you get a DISCOUNT of 25 cents per gallon of gas (paid for by the rich folks driving their gigantic 10 mpg gas hogs). All remaining money in this tax fund after accounting for the price discount to the super efficient folks then goes to improving existing fuel technology and developing better.
This would provide an additional incentive for people to use less gas, and to use more efficient cars. You'd still have the freedom, should you wish to expend your wealth doing it, to drive any gas guzzler you want, of course, but doing so would at the same time help finance rewarding people who push the limits of efficiency and help pay for development of even greater efficiency.
Oral sex was also considered abnormal (inhuman, disgusting, yada yada) once upon a time. I hope we don't have to go back to pre-BJ days, because that would suck. Or not suck, I guess. If you go back far enough, the norm was to throw a woman down and jump her, whether she was willing or not, and raping young boys in conquered cities was not at all abnormal. Depends on the society, where they draw moral lines as relates to sexuality. Personally, as long as everyone involved is consensual, and nobody involved is prepubescent, and everyone's happy after they're done with their business, then I figure it ain't up to me to try to overlay MY sexual values on people who are happy without my interference.
Liberals are more of the 'do whatever you want as long as there are no children involved and everyone consents' whereas conservatives tend to be more of the 'do it our way or it's wrong and you need to be punished, because our morals > yours anytime the two aren't aligned'.
Like I said, it's not always true, but in general it is. Sure, there are exceptions, but by and large, I'd guess in 90 percent of cases, the local populace is happy with our troops (and their money), especially in cases where the base is new enough that they remember what their lives were like economically before our base was there.
I've lived in some of those countries that you mentioned, near or on U.S. military bases. You were apparently seeming to imply that our bases are not wanted in those countries. From experience, I can say that you are wrong about that. Everywhere there is a U.S. base, there are huge economic benefits for the surrounding area. The people NEAR the bases generally greatly wish those bases to remain where they are, because the bases positively impact their quality of life. If you go ask a mountain farm family in eastern Turkey whether they would like the airbase at Incirlik gone, they will probably say yes. However, if you ask the same question of a Turkish family living near Incirlik, 9 times out of 10 you will get the opposite reaction: "Hell no, we don't want them to leave!" That's not *always* the case, but it is true more often than not, that our bases are desired, at least by the majority of those living near enough to them to reap the economic benefits. By and large, once people get to know us (by getting to know our troops when they're not on duty), they like us. Those who never meet us never see us as actual people, so of course they are negatively biased.
The problem is, if everyone except the child pornographers do that, then you have handed them a more substantial percentage of Freenet than they might otherwise have. It's better to join Freenet and contribute non child pornography to it than it is to simply ignore it and pretend it doesn't exist. It's sort of like voting with your data and your preferences. If you don't like politicians and therefore do not participate in a democracy, you certainly can't effect any change, even changes you believe in. I'm not saying you can eradicate the child porn by being a Freenet node, but what you CAN do is decrease the percentage of child porn data that exists on Freenet as compared to the total overall data. Only by participating in a non child porn way can you hope to effect such change. You do have to accept the evil with the good when it comes to absolute freedom, but you have the power to make the AMOUNT of good greater in proportion to the amount of evil. Or you can stay disconnected and thereby help increase the proportion of evil.
Eh? Some countries in Africa have already risen up to overthrow their governments. When you mistreat a majority of your population, that's always a risk. We'd be wise to learn that.
And do I want to be rich? Well, 'rich' is a subjective and relative term. What people usually mean by it is, 'have a lot more than their neighbors' or 'have a lot more than the common man'. I want to live comfortably, and I do, and that's vastly more important to me than how I'm doing in comparison to someone else. In fact, I think I'd find it preferable if everyone lived as comfortably as I do, rather than that I have vastly more than my neighbors or vastly more than the common man. I don't need to stand on others to prop myself up. I'd rather we all stand together.
It will be a sad day when all social programs are gone. That'll mean no public roadways, no public education, no public anything. In that type of society, the rich get richer and more powerful, and the poor don't have a chance to better their lives, because they can't afford an education and can't afford to pay the tolls on all the private roads to get to work. The phrase 'everyone is created equal', meaning everyone has equal opportunity, however much of its meaning has already been lost, would be completely meaningless then. Of course, we won't ever get to that point, because when things get that bad, the poor outnumber the rich, and they rise up, kill all the rich, and start over. It's happened many times in the past. I would have thought we were past that, but perhaps not.
Well, I'm not really impressed with G's record, security-wise. Does anyone feel safer? There was also a study done to figure out the net overall real cost of invading Iraq, and that cost was between 1 and 2 trillion dollars (depending on how conservative you went in this area or that). I'm thinking that for 1 or 2 trillion dollars, there might have been better ways to beef up our security than smacking a hornet's nest of potential terrorists. I mean, did we even have our politicians sit down and say, 'Hey guys, yeah, we can invade Iraq, and maybe Saddam has some WMDs (and maybe he doesn't), but the cost, well, might be a couple trillion bucks. Is that the BEST way to improve national security for that much money?' For a two trillion dollar investment, I want to get more out of it than a bunch of pissed off Muslims, personally. But hey, as long as G thought that was the best way to use that much money to improve national security, well, that's what really matters. *cough*
To put that amount in perspective, it would've been cheaper to give every single Iraqi man, woman and child a bit over $70,000 in cash, which would allow pretty much every family there to live in relative comfort for the rest of their lives. Just airlift in the money, in singles, and dump it out the hatch. (Not sure how many cargo planes it'd take to hold two trillion dollars in singles, but I bet it'd be pretty many!) They'd be so busy running around amassing (our) wealth that there'd be no time for planting bombs or killing us or each other. In fact, after that, why would they WANT to kill us?
Quote: "On the surface, it seems he was intent on rubbing out every trace of the data, so he must have known it was sensitive and unique."
That same argument could be used in any case involving data that is encrypted. Yet, the act of encryption does not imbue the data encrypted with any other qualities. Nothing forbids one from encrypting *everything*, no matter how mundane. It's not illegal or even immoral to be paranoid. And does encrypting (or deleting) data transform that data from mundane to sensitive and unique? Of course not. I don't see how it can be proved that data that no longer exists was too sensitive to delete. Proving anything at all about something that doesn't exist seems to be impossible, just on the basis of logic. Of course, that hasn't stopped religions from becoming widespread.
The problem with a mission to Mars is that every such project inevitably makes the underlying assumption that the people you send there must also come back. If the people you send there STAY there, then you don't need to send along all the stuff you need to return them (which dramatically complicates everything). Instead of a return vehicle and fuel, you send what they need to stay there. And I believe we have the technology to eliminate the radiation threat on the journey there: shielding, in whatever strength and thickness is necessary.
Now you're going to ask, who in their right mind would sign up for a one-way journey to Mars? I would, for sure, as long as I was reasonably convinced that I'd be given enough tools to maximize my odds of surviving a fair amount of time, and some assurance that I wouldn't be totally abandoned (e.g., there would be future supply missions at the very least). I'm sure I'm not the only one willing to risk my life and ultimately devote the rest of my life to such an achievement for humanity.
The amount of science a few people can do on Mars in a year or two is dwarfed by the amount of science one person can do who lives out the rest of his life there. And once you have one person dug in permanently, adding more people becomes easier. Newer people could arrive with their apartments already carved out for them, the electricity and ventilation already wired and piped in preparation for their arrival, additional hydroponics to support them already grown with new crops on the way. Forget about the idea of bringing people or samples back. Once you toss that plan and embrace the idea that anyone you send is there to stay, things get easier in many ways. For example, instead of sending enough fuel and a craft to return a sample, just send the equipment needed to analyze that sample to Mars and let the person or persons living there analyze it and send back the data. They can then use that equipment to analyze MANY samples instead of just one. Instead of sending heavily shielded return craft and fuel to bring people back, send parts and equipment necessary to keep the people there alive.
Instead of considering a trip to Mars an 'exploration mission', consider it a 'colonization mission'. That is, I think, the key to success. Sending people there and bringing them back over and over is stupidly wasteful. I don't even really see a lot of point in that. I do see a point in sending colonists, however.
"Hey baby, I'm a scientist with a focus on spiders. Wanna go out with me?"
Let's say all artists get together and say that they are going to charge 5 bucks a song, and they hold the line on that, *and* do not let their masters go *anywhere* until they have presold 1 million copies. That is, until they have been paid 5 million bucks, nobody anywhere gets that song in anything higher than 64kbps mp3 format. Since at that point, the song only exists in one place in lossless format, the public (as a whole) then has two options: 1) forget the song and nobody ever gets it; or 2) fork over the bucks. That's it, those two choices. No going to a P2P site and downloading it, no getting a friend to buy it and making a copy, all those choices gone, out the window.
Now think if every artist did this. Society would then collectively have those same two options. Forget any new music, or start forking over the money, and the product isn't released in any quality format UNTIL the money's been paid. E.g., you pay for the goods, and you pay first BEFORE you get the goods (other than 64kbps mp3s). In the past it's been, release a product and see how many you sell. Digital duplication could force artists into a new model: don't release a product (other than low quality trial format) until there's enough guarnateed money to make it worthwhile to allow society to have access to it. It's not like society could argue that point -- the creators have the control.
Take it a step farther. Artists decide to only sell their new music (or books, paintings, whatever) to ONE customer, for, say, $100k per song (book, whatever), and those who buy it are not authorized to release it, duplicate it, sell it, just to listen to it (read it, view it, whatever) for their own pleasure. New music suddenly attains scarcity value, and the rich (being the only ones who can really afford new music) become the ones who support what is left of the music industry, by establishing personal collections. Much like wealthy patrons of the past supporting and contracting sculptors or painters, before copyrights existed, for personal works. In this case, the public as a whole is left out of the picture entirely, except for the wealthy elite, who have their own personal private collections which they might trade among themselves. And really, once they've paid that much for something, why would they *want* to lower its value by reducing its scarcity? Rich people like rare stuff. If all musicians wanted to act cohesively, they could simply revert back to the ways of old, and have the wealthy of society be the benefactors, and sole beneficiaries of their work. Again, the public would have no choice in this matter.
If the artists act as a cohesive collective whole (which may not and probably will not ever happen, however possible it is), then really nobody has power equal to theirs, in terms of control over their products. Not the RIAA, not the public, not anybody. He who can destroy a thing has complete power over that thing, and when an artistic item exists in only one form (e.g. before it is digitally mass duplicated), it is the artist who created it who has that ultimate power.
If artists become so beleagured due to digitization and mass duplication of their works, they might just become such a cohesive whole, at which time they can decide their own destiny, regardless of what the RIAA or the general public thinks or wants. It would be interesting to see it get to the point where that happens. Unfortunately, I'm not one of the wealthy, so I might have to make due with stuff that's already available, and nothing new, but I'd still have the ability to *become* one of the wealthy benefactors/beneficiaries at some point and then partake in new books/songs/whatevers, and trade with other members of the wealthy elite.
Or a chubby girlfriend works in a pinch!
How about they run it *exactly* as a library, but with a digital spin. Let's say that at any one time, there are 3 people wanting to search the book, "The Mote in God's Eye" by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle. Sooo...Google buys three copies of this book, and while those three users are using those three licenses, no one else can. And when they are done (they click "done" somewhere, or the book autmatically digitally disappears or becomes unuseable thanks to some DRM), then those copies go back into "circulation". Now repeat this process for every book in existence. The more popular books they will need to buy perhaps 100,000 licenses for, to supply the whole world. The less popular books, 1 or 2 copies, of course. This is exactly the premise that libraries operate under, so why not? Note that this same checkin/checkout procedure, if the DRM were strong enough, could also be done for songs, or movies. How many people are, right now, watching the Disney version of Aladdin? 100? Okay then, they buy 100 copies and that supplies the world. The difference between this potential digital superlibrary and normal libraries is convenience and efficiency. A normal library serves a small area. Geography becomes irrelevant when the data is digital. And efficiency? This would be close to 100 percent efficient utilization of every license purchased by the library, vastly more efficient than current libraries. More than a thousand times as efficient. Google could even automate new license acquisition. For example, a new Stephen King book comes out. A person requests it. There is no license available, so Google auto-buys a license from wherever (Amazon, Stephen King himself, whatever). Another person requests it, Google autobuys another. Eventually enough licenses have been purchased that that number handles the peak useage on those licenses, and no license for that particular work need ever be purchased again, because there's now enough to satify the demands of the world in perpetuity. And more on efficiency. You buy a license for a Madonna song, say, from iTunes. While you are listening to that song, you wonder how many other people in the world are also, at that very same instant, listening to that song. As long as licenses are easy to acquire from the superlibrary and as long as they are returned when they are not in use, so *others* can use them, then license useage becomes massively efficient. If you have purchased from iTunes the license to 5,000 songs, and spent 5 grand doing it, how many of those songs are you listening to AT ANY ONE TIME? One. So your license efficiency is 1/5000. While you are listening to one song, the licenses for the other 4,999 are being WASTED. A superlibrary would not have any such waste. The technology is there to do this. I'm not sure of the legality of transferring licenses back and forth over a network, but assuming that hurdle could be overcome, there is nothing at all unethical about such a superlibrary. I am convinced that, sooner or later, such will arise, whether it's Google that does it, or some government, or some multi-national non-profit group.
Copyright is just law that protects a creator's ability to make a living creating. I'm not sure abolishing that would be a sociologically good thing. The average creator (say, a low-to-mid-level writer, writes good stuff, but not great, has a small audience, never hits any top 10 lists) makes maybe 40k or 50k a year. You take that 40k or 50k away and he's not just giving up a new gold-plated pool every third year, he gives up eating, and living with a roof over his head, and paying his children's tuition, and medical care, and insurance. These people in this tier, who are *by far* the majority of creative people, without being able to sell their creative works then get other jobs. Heck, flipping burgers at Mickey D's at least pays a guaranteed check. Would some people keep creating, for free? Sure, absolutely. Not nearly as many though because for the common man (and most creators *are* 'the common man'), paying the bills is important, and if Job A can't do that but Job B can, they do Job B. You'd still have amateurs producing okay stuff, and you'd occasionally have the mega-genius in his creative field come along, but the everyday workmen (who produce the bulk of all music and writing), without copyrights and laws to protect their income, would disappear. I've said this before. A common counter-argument is that in earlier times, people still created stuff without copyright. Which is true. But take any century prior to copyrights and compare it to any century since copyrights, and the amount of creative works that appeared are miniscule in comparison. Plato, Aristotle, they had rich benefactors. Michaelangelo, he got paid for his work, and royally well too. But how many of the 'common man' creators were there in the 15th or 16th centuries? Not many. Very few in fact. The few creators there were in earlier times, say the 16th century and prior, had wealthy patrons, were wealthy themselves, were recognized masters in their field, or lived in abject poverty and were recognized for their work posthumously. Is that what we want to go back to? A life with perhaps 5 percent of the creative works produced each year compared to what is produced each year now? Personally, I want a creatively rich world, where creating artistic works of any type is a valued human endeavor. Valued in the sense that those who can do it, and do do it are able to make a decent living. I'd rather have 10,000 creative works which cost money, among which are 20 true creative jewels than only 1 jewel -- even if that 1 jewel of creativity is free. On the other hand, because we *have* valued creativity, and have done so for some time now, I suppose it's possible that we will reach a point where there is simply 'enough' available content, and as a whole the human race will stop caring about (e.g. valuing) NEW creative content. When that happens, then yes, it will be very close to time to abolish copyright laws and protections. Nothing says the human race isn't ultimately destined for creative stagnation. Perhaps we are.