Optimum Copyright Period Decided by Math
Posted by Zonk on Friday July 13 2007, @03:26PM
from the everybody-wins dept.
An anonymous reader writes "So how long should a copyright be valid for? A Cambridge student has stepped into the discussion with a dispassionately calculated estimate of the optimal period a copyright should be granted. Ars' point of view: 'Neither the US nor the UK are in any danger of rethinking copyright law from scratch, but if they were looking for guidance in how to set up their systems, Pollock has it. He develops a set of equations focused specifically on the length of copyright and uses as much empirical data as possible to crunch the numbers. The result? An optimal copyright term of 14 years, which is designed to encourage the best balance of incentive to create new work and social welfare that comes from having work enter the public domain (where it often inspires new creative acts).' The original paper is available (pdf) online."
Somebody needs to educate these kids on how political change is really achieved in our system of government.
While you're at it, could you please educate the other 6690 million of us how political change is really achieved in your (presumably, USA) system of government?
'Cause it's unclear to us that you are willing to look towards the future of our planet.
Superheroes.. moral, positive message.. sounds like we need to go back in time a bit...
to Sweden in the seventies...
Pippi Longstocking!
If Pippi and Spider-man were in combat, she'd drive him to tears with a few well-placed jokes, I'm sure of it! (and afterwards invite him over for tea).
Great! I had no idea that Suske & Wiske had been translated into English (obvious, I guess..).
I believe that people who haven't read Suske & Wiske, Asterix and Kuifje as kids have *no idea* what the mysterious fount of wisdom is that all those semi-intellectuals around them seem to have gained their broad intellectual development from.
And if you tell them you read <random factoid> in a Suske & Wiske cartoon when you were 8, they *still* look at you as if they don't believe you.
For young children I can recommend "Pol Pel & Pingo", in Swedish "Rasmus Nalle", in English apparently "Barnaby Bear", because while the main characters are having their adventures following the (very easy and simple) story line, there's always someone wandering off doing something completely unrelated, which is a realistic but hilarious effect once you notice it.
How come most of the good "strips" for children are from NL, BE and FR? Is that just a matter of selection bias? I like US cartoons like "Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers" (inc. the cat) but I don't think many parents would recommend that to their kids, just as they probably wouldn't show the delirious fantasies of the french Humanoïdes Associés ppl (Philippe Druillet comes to mind).
It has been warming.
I don't remember the exact details, but I thought it was like this:
If you cherry-pick the two years 1998 and 2008 (1998 being quite warm and 2008 a bit colder than the trend), and fit a line on the 10 temperatures from that particular 10 year period, then you can't say with 95% certainty that there's an upward trend, but only with less certainty IIRC. And they put Phil Jones on the spot "can you say with 95% certainty that it became warmer in that 10 year period?". So he had to say no.
I used the emotionally laden word cherry-pick because if you take another recent period of 10 years, or another period ending at 2008, or another period starting at 1998, then the upward trend is much clearer.
Please look at the graph: http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/Fig.A2.gif .
Guess why the years 1998 and 2008 were taken. Get the data yourself (from NOAA or HadCRUT3), and plot it with something that can draw a linear regression line from the past 15 years that you mentioned (1996 to 2011) or just use a ruler and some common sense to draw a line through the points.
Then do the same for 1998 to 2008 (the cherry-picked data), and finally to see the famous "hockey-stick" one from 1898 to 2008.
Don't waste your time arguing why I'm wrong or stupid, just go download that data and draw it for yourself. I dare you.
Let us all pray that happens *AFTER* the USA government has put all their nuclear waste somewhere safe. Think about it: would a small country accept being a nuclear waste dump for its rival neighbour?
It's because you're locked into a two-party-system. Seriously.
In a multi-party system, Ron and Rand Paul would have their own small political party, trying to occupy the pivot point for some political issues; the Republicans would be split into the "Tea Party" and "Fundamentalist Christian Party" and "Rich People Power Party" and "War-monger Party", the Democrats would be split into the "Rich People Power Party" and "War-monger Party" and "Hollywood rules the world" party, and the Greens and Nazis and Libertarians would work hard to get above the 5% election threshold that would give them free airtime and debate time and money for posters (I can't believe anyone in your country really wants to give political parties the money to inflict robo-calls on you).
What you have now instead, is the best government money can buy. But that works for itself, not for you the voter. And it is not in its best interest to change the status quo.
Proportional representation better for democracy
on
In Nothing We Trust
·
· Score: 2
Well I've got an idea for you Americans, see if you like it:
You're going to have presidential elections in November.
Form a national political party with only one single goal: constitutional reform so that the voting changes to the more normal multi-party system that all democracies in the world use (except for USA, UK and I believe a few more UK-commonwealth states).
Make sure to solemnly pledge to relinquish power and hold new elections once the constitution has been adapted for the new voting system.
You're only thinking that your current system is normal and/or effective because you grew up with it, and because your closest allies the UK and Canada have the same broken system (the UK Lib Dems *could* have changed all that but for some reason decided not to, now that they finally have a coalition government).
Very few people will understand. The majority will only see that Youtube's sound for videos is malfunctioning, blame Google, and move on. Because most people do not understand the connection between "who they vote for" and "what political decisions are taken".
If I was you, I'd grow Yellow Calamine Violets (Viola Calaminaria) in your garden, burn them, and use the ash.
Also, I think it's common and easy to mine, otherwise people wouldn't bother to dig up 7 million metric tons of the stuff every year. Glad you asked.
The rest of the world uses celsius, which is just as arbitrary.
Excuse me? Are you claiming that the temperature of the melting and boiling point of water at stp is just as arbitrary as the temperature of mrs. Fahrenheit's armpit (I reckon she's dead by now so we can't use her to calibrate anymore):
The philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London, vol. XXXIII, p. 22 (1724):
The third limit is at the 96th degree, to which the
spirits are dilated, while the thermometer is held in the mouth or under the armpits of a healthful person, till it perfectly have acquired the same degree of heat
with the body.
This USGS article says (see figure 2; note logarithmic scale) that currently, 7 million metric tons of Zinc are mined annually. So, it's cheap. I agree with pence128 that a bit extra for use as catalyst will NOT show up as a blip on the radar.
I zink that you are on to somezing.
Please note, also, that these people are already LONG DEAD and the "petroleum age" which is now coming to an end has made their research unnecessary for about a century.
Can anyone point out if there's anything wrong with:
1. 4CH4 + 2O2 + 2CO2 -> 6H2 + 6CO + 2H2O
(exothermic, high temperature high pressure, autothermal reforming)
2. condense the water out? or somehow drive the water gas shift reaction so that you've got the right proportions for CO and H2
3. 6CO + 6H2 -> 3 CO + 3 CH3OH (high temperature high pressure with catalyst)
4. condense the methanol out or use it for the (extremely dirty?) Fischer-Tropsch process to make gasoline.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_gas_shift_reaction
where unfortunately the CO and H2 are on different sides of the equation, followed by
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanol#Production
I suppose if you cool it down from the 250C the methanol is the first that becomes liquid and can be extracted, driving the reaction to the methanol-producing side (maybe it's already liquid at 250C and 50--100 atm).
Are there any cars that drive on methanol? I know in Brazil they use ethanol.
Is there any particular reason why you use a colloid compound? Is it because it's heavier (more Daltons) and yet cheaper than Xenon atoms?
Also, if you turn your drive on for a year, wouldn't the extractor grid electrode get gummed up or "poisoned" with the molecules that are too lazy to be accelerated "to infinity and beyond" by the second acceleration electrode?
Cool technology, thank you for participating here on Slashdot.
If you warm up a blanket in winter, and then put it on your bed and go to sleep under it, it's naïve to believe that you stay nicely warm in bed because of the residual heat of warming that blanket before use.
CO2 is a blanket.
To maintain the magnetic Tokamak bottle, I understand you want the superconducting Niobium-Tin coils to keep on conducting for years.
Has there been any study of whether they could quench if the material degrades or gets transmuted because of the continuous neutron flux?
Another question: besides Tritium, do you expect materials of the reactor to become radioactive because of neutron capture and if so which isotopes and which half-lives would you expect to be the longest-lived waste products?
Slashdot Mirror
You don't say.
Dutch cartoonist Jos Collignon was right: picture of space shuttle.
I always wondered why the thing had to be strapped *SIDEWAYS* to its fueltank and booster rockets.
All this discussion about what would happen if 5 years was too short reminded me of a similar discussion several years ago.
But I had forgotten the guy's name..
In 2007 the following discussion was held on
http://science.slashdot.org/story/07/07/13/1233201/optimum-copyright-period-decided-by-math
(emphasis mine)
Link to original article: Rufus Pollock, Cambridge University, "Forever minus a day? Some theory and empirics of optimal copyright.
While you're at it, could you please educate the other 6690 million of us how political change is really achieved in your (presumably, USA) system of government?
'Cause it's unclear to us that you are willing to look towards the future of our planet.
Maus is *not* for children.. it gives me a belly-ache as an adult, and that's saying something...
Beautiful and thought-provoking story though.
Superheroes.. moral, positive message.. sounds like we need to go back in time a bit...
to Sweden in the seventies...
Pippi Longstocking!
If Pippi and Spider-man were in combat, she'd drive him to tears with a few well-placed jokes, I'm sure of it! (and afterwards invite him over for tea).
Think about that "Pol Pel & Pingo / Rasmus Nalle / Rasmus Klump / Bruin" then; I think it's still comprehensible (just about) without the text.
Great! I had no idea that Suske & Wiske had been translated into English (obvious, I guess..).
I believe that people who haven't read Suske & Wiske, Asterix and Kuifje as kids have *no idea* what the mysterious fount of wisdom is that all those semi-intellectuals around them seem to have gained their broad intellectual development from.
And if you tell them you read <random factoid> in a Suske & Wiske cartoon when you were 8, they *still* look at you as if they don't believe you.
For young children I can recommend "Pol Pel & Pingo", in Swedish "Rasmus Nalle", in English apparently "Barnaby Bear", because while the main characters are having their adventures following the (very easy and simple) story line, there's always someone wandering off doing something completely unrelated, which is a realistic but hilarious effect once you notice it.
How come most of the good "strips" for children are from NL, BE and FR? Is that just a matter of selection bias? I like US cartoons like "Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers" (inc. the cat) but I don't think many parents would recommend that to their kids, just as they probably wouldn't show the delirious fantasies of the french Humanoïdes Associés ppl (Philippe Druillet comes to mind).
It has been warming.
I don't remember the exact details, but I thought it was like this:
If you cherry-pick the two years 1998 and 2008 (1998 being quite warm and 2008 a bit colder than the trend), and fit a line on the 10 temperatures from that particular 10 year period, then you can't say with 95% certainty that there's an upward trend, but only with less certainty IIRC. And they put Phil Jones on the spot "can you say with 95% certainty that it became warmer in that 10 year period?". So he had to say no.
I used the emotionally laden word cherry-pick because if you take another recent period of 10 years, or another period ending at 2008, or another period starting at 1998, then the upward trend is much clearer.
Please look at the graph: http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/Fig.A2.gif .
Guess why the years 1998 and 2008 were taken. Get the data yourself (from NOAA or HadCRUT3), and plot it with something that can draw a linear regression line from the past 15 years that you mentioned (1996 to 2011) or just use a ruler and some common sense to draw a line through the points.
Then do the same for 1998 to 2008 (the cherry-picked data), and finally to see the famous "hockey-stick" one from 1898 to 2008.
Don't waste your time arguing why I'm wrong or stupid, just go download that data and draw it for yourself. I dare you.
Thanks, that illustrates that even after years of Slashdot-reading, I still don't understand how the US political system works ;-)
Let us all pray that happens *AFTER* the USA government has put all their nuclear waste somewhere safe. Think about it: would a small country accept being a nuclear waste dump for its rival neighbour?
It's because you're locked into a two-party-system. Seriously.
In a multi-party system, Ron and Rand Paul would have their own small political party, trying to occupy the pivot point for some political issues; the Republicans would be split into the "Tea Party" and "Fundamentalist Christian Party" and "Rich People Power Party" and "War-monger Party", the Democrats would be split into the "Rich People Power Party" and "War-monger Party" and "Hollywood rules the world" party, and the Greens and Nazis and Libertarians would work hard to get above the 5% election threshold that would give them free airtime and debate time and money for posters (I can't believe anyone in your country really wants to give political parties the money to inflict robo-calls on you).
What you have now instead, is the best government money can buy. But that works for itself, not for you the voter. And it is not in its best interest to change the status quo.
Well I've got an idea for you Americans, see if you like it:
You're going to have presidential elections in November.
Form a national political party with only one single goal: constitutional reform so that the voting changes to the more normal multi-party system that all democracies in the world use (except for USA, UK and I believe a few more UK-commonwealth states).
Make sure to solemnly pledge to relinquish power and hold new elections once the constitution has been adapted for the new voting system.
You're only thinking that your current system is normal and/or effective because you grew up with it, and because your closest allies the UK and Canada have the same broken system (the UK Lib Dems *could* have changed all that but for some reason decided not to, now that they finally have a coalition government).
Wikipedia links: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-past-the-post_voting
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proportional_representation
Yet in other news, a month ago Slashdot reported that 7% of German voters in the Bundesland Saarland voted for the German Pirate Party.
Exactly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_to_Stay.
Unfortunately, apparently NASA are looking for input for *new* ideas for Mars exploration, and this idea has been looked at already, I presume.
Jag också. Of "Duitsland", da's ook goed.
If I was you, I'd grow Yellow Calamine Violets (Viola Calaminaria) in your garden, burn them, and use the ash.
Also, I think it's common and easy to mine, otherwise people wouldn't bother to dig up 7 million metric tons of the stuff every year. Glad you asked.
Excuse me? Are you claiming that the temperature of the melting and boiling point of water at stp is just as arbitrary as the temperature of mrs. Fahrenheit's armpit (I reckon she's dead by now so we can't use her to calibrate anymore):
This USGS article says (see figure 2; note logarithmic scale) that currently, 7 million metric tons of Zinc are mined annually. So, it's cheap. I agree with pence128 that a bit extra for use as catalyst will NOT show up as a blip on the radar.
I zink that you are on to somezing.
Please note, also, that these people are already LONG DEAD and the "petroleum age" which is now coming to an end has made their research unnecessary for about a century.
see ozmanjusri's comment http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2766393&cid=39581439, but if you also have CH4 (biogas from cow shit?) it becomes even easier because you can start with a methane reformer.
You can burn a bit of the natural gas to get the temperature up to 800C.
Can anyone point out if there's anything wrong with:
1. 4CH4 + 2O2 + 2CO2 -> 6H2 + 6CO + 2H2O (exothermic, high temperature high pressure, autothermal reforming)
2. condense the water out? or somehow drive the water gas shift reaction so that you've got the right proportions for CO and H2
3. 6CO + 6H2 -> 3 CO + 3 CH3OH (high temperature high pressure with catalyst)
4. condense the methanol out or use it for the (extremely dirty?) Fischer-Tropsch process to make gasoline.
Ooh, nice one!! Looks like it goes like this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_gas_shift_reaction
where unfortunately the CO and H2 are on different sides of the equation, followed by
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methanol#Production I suppose if you cool it down from the 250C the methanol is the first that becomes liquid and can be extracted, driving the reaction to the methanol-producing side (maybe it's already liquid at 250C and 50--100 atm).
Are there any cars that drive on methanol? I know in Brazil they use ethanol.
I looked at the picture "Basic architecture of the electrostatic colloid thruster system" on the website (http://microthrust.live.valentnet.nl/technology/93-28.aspx).
Is there any particular reason why you use a colloid compound? Is it because it's heavier (more Daltons) and yet cheaper than Xenon atoms?
Also, if you turn your drive on for a year, wouldn't the extractor grid electrode get gummed up or "poisoned" with the molecules that are too lazy to be accelerated "to infinity and beyond" by the second acceleration electrode?
Cool technology, thank you for participating here on Slashdot.
Blu-what?
Ah, are you talking about those blue cardboard shelves with unusable expensive DVDs in the supermarket?
Not interested.
If you warm up a blanket in winter, and then put it on your bed and go to sleep under it, it's naïve to believe that you stay nicely warm in bed because of the residual heat of warming that blanket before use.
CO2 is a blanket.
To maintain the magnetic Tokamak bottle, I understand you want the superconducting Niobium-Tin coils to keep on conducting for years.
Has there been any study of whether they could quench if the material degrades or gets transmuted because of the continuous neutron flux?
Another question: besides Tritium, do you expect materials of the reactor to become radioactive because of neutron capture and if so which isotopes and which half-lives would you expect to be the longest-lived waste products?