The statement makes absolutely no sense. It's like saying that if I buy an FTP program and use it to uload viruses, then the maker of the FTP program has authorised me to do so and can be found liable. It's also clear from the article that the judge invovled here is knows nothing about technology and doesn't seem to be very interested in learning. In my eyes this should disqualify him from the case due to incompetence.
I once thought as you. I mean, really, how can Sharman be held responsible for what the users share on the network, I mean sure it is their network, but anyone can access it right? How are they to blame?
Sharman lost this case not because the Australian record industy had a tight case against them, but because they were idiots and they lied.
Kazaa: We are not resposible for what people put on the network, we can't stop people searching for copyrighted material
ARIA Lawers: But you can influence the search result
Kazaa: Nope, we can't do that
ARIA Lawers: But you do, with these "Gold Files"
Kazza: Ah, but that's so we can make money and boost the exposure of certain files, we can't manipulate what people search for, nore can we block it.
ARIA Lawers: so people can download Child Pornography from your network?
Kazaa: oh no, we would never allow that, we attempt to block that
ARIA Lawer: so you can filter search resuls and block files
Kazaa: nope, we can't do that...
and this was how it went for the ENTIRE case. Kazaa were idiots, they lied to the court about what their software was capable of, there were monitoring files even though they told the court it could not be done. they shot themselves in the foot repeatedly.
Judge Wilcox was a very good choice to hear this case, I don't think that he had any lack of understanding, he had many meetings with both parties to understand what the technologies in this case were about. But Kazaa lied, changed their arguments, ran around in circles. They lost because they were interested in one thing only, MONEY. and they had a massive infrastructure built around new ways to make money. problem was, that this very infrastructure could be used to do all the things that Kazaa said they couldn't do.
I had hoped that Kazaa would win this case, but after reading the reports from the case I can assure you they had no hope whatsoever
Read about it for yourself here . These reports are written in a comical manner, but I believe that this is the best way to view this, it makes the story a little more palatable
well, like anything, it varies. $27.99 is a popular price I have seen recently. However, I paid $21.99 for Garbage's new album when it was released though.
$25-$30 would be the expected cost though
I guess from EMI's point of view, if Apple wants to continue offering their content (and let's not delude ourselves, they do own it) after the contract is re-negoited (which I "believe" is due to happen next year for the US) they can tell Apple how they are going to price the content.
Then it becomes an issue of Apple either accepting that they need to pay EMI more than the 70c per track they do now and either absorbing this cost (if they are recouping the money from iPod sales it may be an option) or passing it on to the consumer, which would lead to the variable pricing scheme.
If Apple choses not to accept this plan and EMI bow out of the iTunes store the question becomes where is EMI going to get their digital sales from. In Australia Sony/BMG is not a partner in iTunes. we also don't have 99c per track, but the price I guess falls to dollar values and we pay $1.69. Now Sony/BMG have teamed up with Telstra (our tele-communication overlords) and their broadband provider, Bigpond to give us Bigpond Music. A quick browse around gave me Madonna - Like a Prayer at $1.89 and most other songs seem to follow that same pricing scheme. so it is not that Sony/BMG wanted a variable pricing scheme, they want more money.
The iTunes advantage is that it a central place for people to visit and buy digital music. EMI and other record companies now face the choice of either setting up their own digital music distribution with any pricing scheme they wish, or negoiate with Apple and remain part of this centeralised store. Sony/BMG has already decided to bow out in Japan and Australia, it would be interesting to see what happens in 6 months time when Sony/BMG have a look at the sales figures, but I guess we will have to wait. As will the other record companies. If Sony/BMG make a go of this an turn a tidy profit I "Guarantee" other companies will follow suit. if Sony do not do as well as they might have with iTunes then Apple will have a bit of clout and may be able to dictate some pricing structure to the record companies
But we will have to wait either way to see where this leads. EMI at the moment is spouting crap to pressure Apple to see things their way
yeah, there aren't much in the way of large ferocious animals in Oz, but I tell you, if it's not venomous, it's poisonous.
However, Kangaroos are pretty vicious in the wild, they will disembowel a person, no problems. Spiders and Snakes, have them in ample supply. Ever seen an angry Emu?
Give me a break, the movie studios have more to fear from the moviegoer texting his frieds that a movie sucks from inside a theather than movie critics.
There was an Article posted on Slashdot a while back about how the MPAA was looking to ban Mobile phones from movie theaters because friends texting friends about bad movies was decreasing the time word of mouth took to spread and was the reason opening weekend profits were dropping
I would post a link, but I can't find it, so if anyone else can, it would be appreciated
You contradict yourself. If region coding does diddley squat, it would not be possible to "squeeze the maximum possible profit out of every market in the world without the low income regions undercutting the high income ones by selling out of the country." because people would just buy in the cheaper region and sell to the more expensive region. (Arbitrage: gotta love it! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arbitrage) You can complain that region coding accomlishes nothing, or you can complain that the movie industry squeezes the maximum profit out according to ability to pay, but you can't do both.
It's Interesting to note that Region encoding's higest success rate is in region 1. In Australia, which is Region 4 (can't speak for regions 3 and 2 from personal experiences, 'cause I don't have any) it is ridiculously simple to get away from regional encoding, because DVD player makers arew not going to have 4 seperate models, so the regional lock is just a software thing, and most Sales Assistants will unlock it for you.
Region encoding is just to divide the market, and the only market that is divided off effectivly is the US. I remember being part of a mailing list that got excited when the first season of Buffy was released in the US on DVD, 2 years after we got them. But I guess the syndication aspect needs it's profit's preserved.
I believe that the ACCC (Australian Competition and Consumer Commission) are investigating the practice and may (or may not, depends on insdury lobbying I guess) bring charges. here is an older article about the practice
Just thought I would add this, for all who care to know
I agree with many of the points in this article and the Parent here. but bear in mind, I am not a subject of the American education system, I was born, educated, live and work in Australia.
I studied Electrical Engineering for 2 years before dropping out and switching to Computing/IT. The reason for my choice, Well, at the University I went to the Electrical Engineers were few and we were lumped into the classes and courses of other streams, Mechanical, Civil and Mining engineering studies. Whilst there are many common themes and subjects that these streams share, what they don't is vastly different. We once brought our concerns to the assistant head of the school who told us that once we finished the subjects we would see the relevance, he once told us "Electricty in a circuit is just like water in a pipe"
That coupled with the fact that many of the good teachers were leaving the school to be replaced with Engineering lectures that had, at best, an arts degree and a year or 2 in management, I decided that the time had come.
But once in Computing and as a whole the greater IT world I discovered why this is so. Universities need to pump out students to get reputations, the reputation leads to more students, Students = Money. Subjects are not taught at University, they are presented. the learning is more or less up to the students. however this creates problems of understanding. I know a 4th year honours student in computing who was afraid to install a sound card.
That aside the University enviroment helped me because I formed a good group of friends and since we were all in the same boat we managed to pull each other through. It's that communal enviroment that still makes University worthwhile
I now work at a company that offers IT Training and Certifications. we have many students, and while I would love to train each one to fully understand the Microsoft Windows system so that the MCSA exam material becomes second knowledge to them, that is not what they pay for, they pay money to get a certification. Students = Money, and if you have 'Money' you can equal 'Student' anywhere.
The reason I highlight this fact is that these are the expecations that our students have, that they can buy an education, and unfortunatly there is very little evidence to suggest that this is not true.
And this does not even begin to question the examination practices that simply prepare students to memorise slabs of text and develp no real problem solving abilities. Which is also a major problem in my eyes, in IT and Engineering. Why is this the case? Because standard mutiple choice/solve problem X for Y is much easier to mark, and we can get a computer to o it. who wants to read through an exam and see if the student has developed an understanding fo the material. Not us in IT certification it seems.
But how do you fix the system, change the expectations and really teach the material? University does prepare the students for the real world. it's a pity that this is what the real world wants.
Slashdot Mirror
I actually prefered to play Prince of Persia on the Mac Classic in monochrome than on the PC in colour. The graphics seemed sharper.
Top Game back in the day, I wasted so much study time to that game, particualy that fat swordsman on level 6!
The statement makes absolutely no sense. It's like saying that if I buy an FTP program and use it to uload viruses, then the maker of the FTP program has authorised me to do so and can be found liable. It's also clear from the article that the judge invovled here is knows nothing about technology and doesn't seem to be very interested in learning. In my eyes this should disqualify him from the case due to incompetence.
I once thought as you. I mean, really, how can Sharman be held responsible for what the users share on the network, I mean sure it is their network, but anyone can access it right? How are they to blame?
Sharman lost this case not because the Australian record industy had a tight case against them, but because they were idiots and they lied.
Kazaa: We are not resposible for what people put on the network, we can't stop people searching for copyrighted material
ARIA Lawers: But you can influence the search result
Kazaa: Nope, we can't do that
ARIA Lawers: But you do, with these "Gold Files"
Kazza: Ah, but that's so we can make money and boost the exposure of certain files, we can't manipulate what people search for, nore can we block it.
ARIA Lawers: so people can download Child Pornography from your network?
Kazaa: oh no, we would never allow that, we attempt to block that
ARIA Lawer: so you can filter search resuls and block files
Kazaa: nope, we can't do that...
and this was how it went for the ENTIRE case. Kazaa were idiots, they lied to the court about what their software was capable of, there were monitoring files even though they told the court it could not be done. they shot themselves in the foot repeatedly.
Judge Wilcox was a very good choice to hear this case, I don't think that he had any lack of understanding, he had many meetings with both parties to understand what the technologies in this case were about. But Kazaa lied, changed their arguments, ran around in circles. They lost because they were interested in one thing only, MONEY. and they had a massive infrastructure built around new ways to make money. problem was, that this very infrastructure could be used to do all the things that Kazaa said they couldn't do.
I had hoped that Kazaa would win this case, but after reading the reports from the case I can assure you they had no hope whatsoever
Read about it for yourself here . These reports are written in a comical manner, but I believe that this is the best way to view this, it makes the story a little more palatable
well, like anything, it varies. $27.99 is a popular price I have seen recently. However, I paid $21.99 for Garbage's new album when it was released though. $25-$30 would be the expected cost though
I guess from EMI's point of view, if Apple wants to continue offering their content (and let's not delude ourselves, they do own it) after the contract is re-negoited (which I "believe" is due to happen next year for the US) they can tell Apple how they are going to price the content.
Then it becomes an issue of Apple either accepting that they need to pay EMI more than the 70c per track they do now and either absorbing this cost (if they are recouping the money from iPod sales it may be an option) or passing it on to the consumer, which would lead to the variable pricing scheme.
If Apple choses not to accept this plan and EMI bow out of the iTunes store the question becomes where is EMI going to get their digital sales from. In Australia Sony/BMG is not a partner in iTunes. we also don't have 99c per track, but the price I guess falls to dollar values and we pay $1.69. Now Sony/BMG have teamed up with Telstra (our tele-communication overlords) and their broadband provider, Bigpond to give us Bigpond Music. A quick browse around gave me Madonna - Like a Prayer at $1.89 and most other songs seem to follow that same pricing scheme. so it is not that Sony/BMG wanted a variable pricing scheme, they want more money.
The iTunes advantage is that it a central place for people to visit and buy digital music. EMI and other record companies now face the choice of either setting up their own digital music distribution with any pricing scheme they wish, or negoiate with Apple and remain part of this centeralised store. Sony/BMG has already decided to bow out in Japan and Australia, it would be interesting to see what happens in 6 months time when Sony/BMG have a look at the sales figures, but I guess we will have to wait. As will the other record companies. If Sony/BMG make a go of this an turn a tidy profit I "Guarantee" other companies will follow suit. if Sony do not do as well as they might have with iTunes then Apple will have a bit of clout and may be able to dictate some pricing structure to the record companies
But we will have to wait either way to see where this leads. EMI at the moment is spouting crap to pressure Apple to see things their way
yeah, there aren't much in the way of large ferocious animals in Oz, but I tell you, if it's not venomous, it's poisonous.
However, Kangaroos are pretty vicious in the wild, they will disembowel a person, no problems. Spiders and Snakes, have them in ample supply. Ever seen an angry Emu?
Dangerous place Australia...
There was an Article posted on Slashdot a while back about how the MPAA was looking to ban Mobile phones from movie theaters because friends texting friends about bad movies was decreasing the time word of mouth took to spread and was the reason opening weekend profits were dropping
I would post a link, but I can't find it, so if anyone else can, it would be appreciated
It's Interesting to note that Region encoding's higest success rate is in region 1. In Australia, which is Region 4 (can't speak for regions 3 and 2 from personal experiences, 'cause I don't have any) it is ridiculously simple to get away from regional encoding, because DVD player makers arew not going to have 4 seperate models, so the regional lock is just a software thing, and most Sales Assistants will unlock it for you.
Region encoding is just to divide the market, and the only market that is divided off effectivly is the US. I remember being part of a mailing list that got excited when the first season of Buffy was released in the US on DVD, 2 years after we got them. But I guess the syndication aspect needs it's profit's preserved. I believe that the ACCC (Australian Competition and Consumer Commission) are investigating the practice and may (or may not, depends on insdury lobbying I guess) bring charges. here is an older article about the practice
Just thought I would add this, for all who care to know
I agree with many of the points in this article and the Parent here. but bear in mind, I am not a subject of the American education system, I was born, educated, live and work in Australia.
I studied Electrical Engineering for 2 years before dropping out and switching to Computing/IT. The reason for my choice, Well, at the University I went to the Electrical Engineers were few and we were lumped into the classes and courses of other streams, Mechanical, Civil and Mining engineering studies. Whilst there are many common themes and subjects that these streams share, what they don't is vastly different. We once brought our concerns to the assistant head of the school who told us that once we finished the subjects we would see the relevance, he once told us "Electricty in a circuit is just like water in a pipe"
That coupled with the fact that many of the good teachers were leaving the school to be replaced with Engineering lectures that had, at best, an arts degree and a year or 2 in management, I decided that the time had come.
But once in Computing and as a whole the greater IT world I discovered why this is so. Universities need to pump out students to get reputations, the reputation leads to more students, Students = Money. Subjects are not taught at University, they are presented. the learning is more or less up to the students. however this creates problems of understanding. I know a 4th year honours student in computing who was afraid to install a sound card.
That aside the University enviroment helped me because I formed a good group of friends and since we were all in the same boat we managed to pull each other through. It's that communal enviroment that still makes University worthwhile
I now work at a company that offers IT Training and Certifications. we have many students, and while I would love to train each one to fully understand the Microsoft Windows system so that the MCSA exam material becomes second knowledge to them, that is not what they pay for, they pay money to get a certification. Students = Money, and if you have 'Money' you can equal 'Student' anywhere.
The reason I highlight this fact is that these are the expecations that our students have, that they can buy an education, and unfortunatly there is very little evidence to suggest that this is not true.
And this does not even begin to question the examination practices that simply prepare students to memorise slabs of text and develp no real problem solving abilities. Which is also a major problem in my eyes, in IT and Engineering. Why is this the case? Because standard mutiple choice/solve problem X for Y is much easier to mark, and we can get a computer to o it. who wants to read through an exam and see if the student has developed an understanding fo the material. Not us in IT certification it seems.
But how do you fix the system, change the expectations and really teach the material? University does prepare the students for the real world. it's a pity that this is what the real world wants.