Freedom always has "restrictive" like the GPL for software, the Bill of Rights for political rights. It would be foolish to argue that we aren't free politically because there are restrictions on, say, whether the government can force us to quarter soldiers
I don't think that's an appropriate analogy. The Bill of Rights restricts the government, not me. The Bill of Rights prevents the [federal] government from passing laws on certain things. The GPL, on the other hand, most certainly does restrict the individual who wants to further distribute the software.
So yes the GPL has restrictions, but that's WHY it's free, since all of those rules are to ensure the freedom of the sourcecode. The BSD has fewer restrictions, which makes it less free.
Curious. Does that mean that items in the public domain are _not_ free? And by further implication, would you argue that some copyright law is better than no copyright law?
Anything broadcast over the public airwaves (_all_ spectra is a natural public resource, spectrum "auctions" be damned), should be considered to have been placed into the public domain (it has, quite literally, but it should apply legally, also).
That should be the price paid to the public for the licensed, exclusive use of that part of our resource by a private party. They want copyright, fine - just use some private, controlled delivery method.
What, then, is the incentive for broadcast? To be sure, some people will do it for the love of broadcasting, or the pleasure of creating something, but who will do the broadcasting? It seems like only funded broadcasts, which have some other motive would be broadcast. For example, someone seeking political influence might be happy to create biased content for free, while underfunded opponents might have difficulty getting their messages out. Would all content by necessity be created by the state?
What happens when someone takes the "private controlled delivery method" and broadcasts that (e.g. buys a DVD then broadcasts it)?
Are satellite communications also public domain? Cell phone calls? Can a broadcaster scramble the signal to prevent unauthorized interception?
If something is "made available", then distribution is only one step away. As you know, items that are "available" are easily obtained - and "evidence" of copyright violation can be done by downloading or obtaining the copies in question.
This case in question sounds like it's arguing a technicality - which is trivial for any lawyer to work around by showing that copies were made from the site (rather than simply being posted.)
I think you're exactly right -- the point of this case is really about the evidentiary problem of showing actual distribution. The copyright law makes distribution of a work the exclusive right of the copyright holder 17 USC 106(3). That is clearly an infringment. This case is trying to lower the requirement of showing actual distribution to merely making available. You would think that showing actual distribution would be fairly simple (that is, just download the file yourself), but it appears that in practice it's not so easy.
In any case, there doesn't seem to be a compelling reason here to classify "making available" as "distribution" as a matter of law. We'll see what the court thinks.
I agree that if what them submitted was short clean pseudocode which conveyed some basic idea, it might help communicate to a overworked dude in the USPO what exactly they're patenting.
Fair enough, though in general when the examiner doesn't understand what's being submitted as a patent, the examiner will require clarification. The same can be true of code. Also, as is true of any patent, it must be clear to one skilled in the art how to enable it. If the code is obfuscated, then the patent would not enable those skilled in the art to create the invention.
One of the requirements of a patent filing is that the inventioned be "enabled" by the specification in the patent 35 USC 112. I have always thought an interesting way of handling business method / software patents would be to require any patent which requires a computer include the actual code needed to enable the invention.
This gives us several benefits: 1) it's more analogous to a physical invention where all the parts have to be described in detail; 2) the source code to enable an invention would be free and public knowledge at the expiration of the patent; and 3) it's useful for others to understand exactly what the inventor is trying to claim as part of his patent. The public would benefit from a better description of the invention, competitors could determine exactly what a patent is supposed to do, and the patentor would not have to face the specter of business method or software patents being eliminated in their entirety (which I'm sure more than a few people will call for).
Actually, we believe that content should be freely distributable ala GPL or Creative Commons.
I'm not certain what meaning the GPL has in the media content field. It provides for protection of a "Program" and it's fairly clear from the text of the license that it's talking about a computer program. The GPL does not require that the Program be given away for free (as in beer) -- it does impose certain requirements on the distributor / copier, but those say nothing about price. For reference, here's the gpl v2.
Creative Commons provides a series of form clauses which may or may not allow the free (as in beer) distribution of a work. It is certainly appropriate for media content (as opposed to software), but does not require that the author give up his or her or its rights, whether those rights be to distribution, derivative works, etc. You might want to look at their license list
.
Both of these licenses rely on an effective and enforceable copyright law. I suppose if all current and future copyrighted works fell into the public domain, there may be no need for the licenses, though I would argue that the GPL has a larger intent than simply putting works into the public domain. In any case, Fox is enforcing its rights under the same copyright law that the Creative Commons licenses and the GPL rely upon.
Therefore, there is no hypocrisy because we would defend FOX if they used a freer license.
What exactly are you looking for? Free Simpsons episodes on Youtube? This wasn't the case of a creative remix or mashup. This wasn't about using clips from the Simpsons in an otherwise creative work. This was the wholesale copy and distribution of Simpsons episodes.
Personally, I'd recommend moving somewhere where your neighbors don't have control of what you do on your property.
Amen! Restrictive covenants have simply gone too far in this country. They control so much of what a property owner can do on his or her own property and become so pervasive that it's difficult to escape them. About the only way to avoid the covenants is to buy isolated land far from civilization.
Or is it OK for the USA to have it but no one else ? I suppose it depends on who you consider the bad guys. I note that China has invaded fewer countries in the last 50 years than the USA has... so what is the answer to the question ?
So is your argument that you desire China to have the military strength to counter the US? Or that perhaps you would prefer that China and the US switched places in relative military strength? I think that some people around here have gone so far as actually to desire that -- but it's a fool's wish.
I think it's fine and good to wish that the US used its military power responsibly, but it's another thing entirely to want China to be equally powerful militarily.
Don't you know that only the person or organization with the most money is ever responsible? That is why you sue the bar for selling the drink and not the person who lets themselves get drunk and then drives home.
Not true -- you sue the person and the bar. It's just that you won't get much out of the person relative to what you'll get from the bar. If you did only sue the bar, the bar could sue the person who drank too much and then drove. It's the wonder of joint and several liability.
Would you prefer the alternative whereby the individual is placed into debtor's prison for being unable to pay? Or perhaps the alternative where a bar can overserve an obviously drunk patron?
I'd assume that AllofMP3 has sold far more than 2 billion songs by now, so there's your free market at work.
I tried to find a number for downloads for AllofMP3, as I agree that has some importance in the discussion. However, allofmp3's prices are something around a tenth of the price for the same track on iTunes at comparative quality. I would argue that your general mass-market consumers consider price foremost, and DRM somewhere way down the list.
As a thought-experiment, consider the scenario where a site has more restrictive DRM than Apple, but has the prices of allofmp3. I would guess that site would be far, far more popular than apple.
Except they're forgetting that this will just result in game designers self-censoring their games so they can get a T.
Perhaps, but there's also apparently a large market which wants to purchase M rated games -- GTA being one of them. If the M rated games sell more, there's a strong economic incentive for the developers to continue making them. In other words, some might self-censor, but others (who are in this to make a profit, after all) will continue to pursue that M rated market.
Why can't we have someone out to show how great Open Source Software is? Talk about what Ubuntu Linux offers, what RedHat and Novel can do for you, what people like about Debian and Gentoo enough to make them use those over more sophisticated derivatives (like Ubuntu), and the various applications.
I agree with you entirely. I don't see any problem with informing people exactly what DRM / trusted computing requirements Vista may contain, but let them draw their own conclusions about it. The emotional campaigns claiming the end of the computing will simply will not succeed, because it's not the end of the computing world for most people. Most people just want to operate their computer, and when they actually see the restrictions for themselves or when they see what the alternative can do -- that's when they'll get upset.
They want hype and venture capital or fame or some such, but I can't count the number of things that are just a few years away and then never materialized.
Agreed, such an extraordinary claim will need an abundance of proof, and that will itself take years. If the research is promising, though, they will have no problem finding money. Such a discovery would make its finders as famous as Salk, and add much to the coffers of, well, the VCs (or Pfizer or Lilly or whomever).
Natural selection is one of the evolutionary processes, just as mutations are.
Natural selection is part of evolution, not something completely different and disjoint.
Fair enough, but you wouldn't refer to, say, "offence" to mean "football". "Offence" is certainly a necessary part of "football" -- it is different, though. I mean, there is a substantive difference between that which the word "evolution" refers, and to which the phrase "natural selection" refers. It is not incorrect to say they are distinct.
Having kept an eye on cpt kangarooski's posts, I believe I can correctly say that there are still civil penalties for unintended copyright infringement
There's no need to rely on any one person for the penalties for or definition of copyright infringement -- go to the source (or Cornell's helpful pseudo-mirror). I agree with you that there may be penalties for unintended infringement.
I also believe that making available copyrighted materials for distribution probably isn't illegal since there is no law that I know of that makes attempting to infringe a civil or criminal offense.
"Attempt" is not a civil wrong. That is, you can't sue in civil court for "attempted assault" -- you either have an assault, or some other theory. On the flip side, "attempt" can attach to any crime (well, there are probably exceptions that don't immediately jump to mind). There's no need for a statute against "attempted assault" because there's a general definition for "attempt" and another for "assault." In theory, there could be a prosecution "attempted copyright infringement" though I can't immediately think of any set of facts where it would happen in practice.
So saying you'll make a copy for someone isn't illegal. It becomes illegal when you actually make the copy.
I think that statement is true, in the same way that saying you're going to murder someone isn't illegal; you actually have to make a significant step towards the comission of the crime.
And how do we decide whether it's on purpose or not?
That is, of course, one of the main jobs of a jury. The law has spent a few thousand years (as long as there has been law) making determinations as to whether the actions of an individual were on purpose or not. It's not a new problem.
Telling me not to use Novell's products if I don't like them ignores the fact that I'm one of the guys who wrote "their" products. I doubt you can install that system without using my software. And thus I'm one of the people who just got screwed because Novell and Microsoft colluded to engineer a way for Novell to welsh on the agreement that comes with my software.
Exactly how are they "welsh[ing] on the agreement that comes with [your] software"? Presumably you chose a particular license under which to release said software. Are they violating that license or breaching a contract? If so, sue them. I imagine you know a few people who would support you in that effort.
If it's a less legally substantial reason that you're displeased, then you're not alone in being a person who did work in good faith, but has discovered that good faith only gets you so far.
If I break into your house and run off with your new HD TV, that's theft. I'm now depriving you of actual property. You no longer have your TV and you can no longer use it.
Okay, correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems that, to you, only tangible property equals "actual property". That is to say, by your argument, no intangible property could be "actual property".
I just pop a flash-drive in your PC, copy the code on my disk, and run off with that instead. You still have your code. I have not deprived you the use of anything. At worst, I have possibly deprived you of potential profits.
I think a plain reading of the law belies that. 17 USC 106 grants the owner of a copyright the "exclusive right" to certain enumerated rights. While I have my code, I have been deprived of my exclusive rights. What I intended to do with that code is also immaterial.
The one is covered under the first amendment, the other is only covered by copyright law. Our constitution holds that all people have the right to own personal property, but nowhere does it imply that we have the right to profit from IP we hold the copy-right to.
I'm not precisely certain what you mean. What is covered here by the first amendment? Creation of the copyright law is, of course, an explicit power of Congress. The Constitution most certainly recognizes the ability of Congress to grant authors a monopoly on their writings for limited periods for the author's profit (see Article I, section 8 of the US Constitution). The monopoly is intended to allow authors to profit so that they have a motivation to create. At the end of the monopoly, the people gain the work for their own usage.
The purpose of copyright law is to stimulate creativity and innovation, not establish innate rights.
This I agree with you on. The method of stimulation, however, is to grant a limited monopoly so that an author can make money on his or her creation. And as a side note, other countries' laws do recognize copyright as sort of an innate right. France, iirc, has a particularly strong presumption that an artist has certain inherent rights in his or her work. The US doesn't really recognize this, though arguable 17 USC 106A is based on that idea.
That's not theft. It's copyright infringement. Illegal yes, but not theft. Theft is depriving someone of property they own. IP is not property that can be owned; you can only hold the rights to distribute it.
This has always been a curious argument to me. All property is like a bundle of rights. For example, you can lease your land to someone else. That person does not have all the rights to the land, but they do possess some rights, even against the true owner.
Or, let's say you have a car. You can sell that car to someone, that is, sell all the rights you possess to that car to someone. You can also transfer something less than all the rights you possess. For example, you could allow someone use of the car for a particular fee, or for a particular period of time.
A copyright is similarly a piece of property. The thing the copyright protects is not tangible, to be sure, but the copyright itself is most certainly property. You can sell it, or you can transfer certain rights that it encompasses.
If you're arguing over nominclature, the word "theft" can be a legally specific term defined in a certain way in a state's criminal code, but that is hardly dispositive of the issue. It might also be "criminal conversion" or "larceny".
In any case, copyright infringement does indeed involve depriving someone of a right granted by law, and that is the exclusive right to copy, distribute, perform, etc. that work (http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/ usc_sec_17_00000106----000-.html). If someone besides the copyright holder performs one of those actions, the copyright holder is deprived of the exclusive right. There are, of course, defenses to violation of that right, just as there are defenses to theft. It does not make it less of a property right.
sweet guilty pleasure of surfing an ever growing heap of crappy games that were crappy when they were new and somehow seem to stink even more as they age and decay
I actually really enjoyed Gametap. Besides Sam & Max, there's most of the King's Quest series, most of the Space Quest series, most of Ultima (the good ones, anyway), Civ 3, Far Cry, Altered Beast, Baldur's Gate I & II, Icewind Dale I & II, Planescape: Torment, Castlevania I-III, Prince of Persia, Contra, and the list goes on.
Now I sound like an ad, which I don't mean to be, but I do think it's a good service with a ton of classic games. Note: I did cancel my subscription, but it was because I wasn't playing any games, not because the game selection was bad.
As I understand it, China doesn't take the hardest line on North Korea because 1) China gets a good deal of trade from NK and more importantly 2) China is concerned about thousands or millions of refugees pouring over their border. Check out a recent Time article at http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1 549298,00.html
Slashdot Mirror
I don't think that's an appropriate analogy. The Bill of Rights restricts the government, not me. The Bill of Rights prevents the [federal] government from passing laws on certain things. The GPL, on the other hand, most certainly does restrict the individual who wants to further distribute the software.
So yes the GPL has restrictions, but that's WHY it's free, since all of those rules are to ensure the freedom of the sourcecode. The BSD has fewer restrictions, which makes it less free.
Curious. Does that mean that items in the public domain are _not_ free? And by further implication, would you argue that some copyright law is better than no copyright law?
That should be the price paid to the public for the licensed, exclusive use of that part of our resource by a private party. They want copyright, fine - just use some private, controlled delivery method.
What, then, is the incentive for broadcast? To be sure, some people will do it for the love of broadcasting, or the pleasure of creating something, but who will do the broadcasting? It seems like only funded broadcasts, which have some other motive would be broadcast. For example, someone seeking political influence might be happy to create biased content for free, while underfunded opponents might have difficulty getting their messages out. Would all content by necessity be created by the state?
What happens when someone takes the "private controlled delivery method" and broadcasts that (e.g. buys a DVD then broadcasts it)?
Are satellite communications also public domain? Cell phone calls? Can a broadcaster scramble the signal to prevent unauthorized interception?
This case in question sounds like it's arguing a technicality - which is trivial for any lawyer to work around by showing that copies were made from the site (rather than simply being posted.)
I think you're exactly right -- the point of this case is really about the evidentiary problem of showing actual distribution. The copyright law makes distribution of a work the exclusive right of the copyright holder 17 USC 106(3). That is clearly an infringment. This case is trying to lower the requirement of showing actual distribution to merely making available. You would think that showing actual distribution would be fairly simple (that is, just download the file yourself), but it appears that in practice it's not so easy.
In any case, there doesn't seem to be a compelling reason here to classify "making available" as "distribution" as a matter of law. We'll see what the court thinks.
Fair enough, though in general when the examiner doesn't understand what's being submitted as a patent, the examiner will require clarification. The same can be true of code. Also, as is true of any patent, it must be clear to one skilled in the art how to enable it. If the code is obfuscated, then the patent would not enable those skilled in the art to create the invention.
This gives us several benefits: 1) it's more analogous to a physical invention where all the parts have to be described in detail; 2) the source code to enable an invention would be free and public knowledge at the expiration of the patent; and 3) it's useful for others to understand exactly what the inventor is trying to claim as part of his patent. The public would benefit from a better description of the invention, competitors could determine exactly what a patent is supposed to do, and the patentor would not have to face the specter of business method or software patents being eliminated in their entirety (which I'm sure more than a few people will call for).
I'm not certain what meaning the GPL has in the media content field. It provides for protection of a "Program" and it's fairly clear from the text of the license that it's talking about a computer program. The GPL does not require that the Program be given away for free (as in beer) -- it does impose certain requirements on the distributor / copier, but those say nothing about price. For reference, here's the gpl v2.
Creative Commons provides a series of form clauses which may or may not allow the free (as in beer) distribution of a work. It is certainly appropriate for media content (as opposed to software), but does not require that the author give up his or her or its rights, whether those rights be to distribution, derivative works, etc. You might want to look at their license list
. Both of these licenses rely on an effective and enforceable copyright law. I suppose if all current and future copyrighted works fell into the public domain, there may be no need for the licenses, though I would argue that the GPL has a larger intent than simply putting works into the public domain. In any case, Fox is enforcing its rights under the same copyright law that the Creative Commons licenses and the GPL rely upon.
Therefore, there is no hypocrisy because we would defend FOX if they used a freer license.
What exactly are you looking for? Free Simpsons episodes on Youtube? This wasn't the case of a creative remix or mashup. This wasn't about using clips from the Simpsons in an otherwise creative work. This was the wholesale copy and distribution of Simpsons episodes.
Amen! Restrictive covenants have simply gone too far in this country. They control so much of what a property owner can do on his or her own property and become so pervasive that it's difficult to escape them. About the only way to avoid the covenants is to buy isolated land far from civilization.
So is your argument that you desire China to have the military strength to counter the US? Or that perhaps you would prefer that China and the US switched places in relative military strength? I think that some people around here have gone so far as actually to desire that -- but it's a fool's wish.
I think it's fine and good to wish that the US used its military power responsibly, but it's another thing entirely to want China to be equally powerful militarily.
Not true -- you sue the person and the bar. It's just that you won't get much out of the person relative to what you'll get from the bar. If you did only sue the bar, the bar could sue the person who drank too much and then drove. It's the wonder of joint and several liability.
Would you prefer the alternative whereby the individual is placed into debtor's prison for being unable to pay? Or perhaps the alternative where a bar can overserve an obviously drunk patron?
I tried to find a number for downloads for AllofMP3, as I agree that has some importance in the discussion. However, allofmp3's prices are something around a tenth of the price for the same track on iTunes at comparative quality. I would argue that your general mass-market consumers consider price foremost, and DRM somewhere way down the list.
As a thought-experiment, consider the scenario where a site has more restrictive DRM than Apple, but has the prices of allofmp3. I would guess that site would be far, far more popular than apple.
Apple has sold around 2 billion songs (see http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/ptech/01/09/apple.mac world.ap/index.html) at this point, which would suggest the free market is supporting DRM.
Out of curiosity, does that mean you believe that a morally wrong action was still the correct action to take?
Perhaps, but there's also apparently a large market which wants to purchase M rated games -- GTA being one of them. If the M rated games sell more, there's a strong economic incentive for the developers to continue making them. In other words, some might self-censor, but others (who are in this to make a profit, after all) will continue to pursue that M rated market.
Don't forget the recent Firewall -- I was embarrassed for Harrison Ford...
I agree with you entirely. I don't see any problem with informing people exactly what DRM / trusted computing requirements Vista may contain, but let them draw their own conclusions about it. The emotional campaigns claiming the end of the computing will simply will not succeed, because it's not the end of the computing world for most people. Most people just want to operate their computer, and when they actually see the restrictions for themselves or when they see what the alternative can do -- that's when they'll get upset.
Agreed, such an extraordinary claim will need an abundance of proof, and that will itself take years. If the research is promising, though, they will have no problem finding money. Such a discovery would make its finders as famous as Salk, and add much to the coffers of, well, the VCs (or Pfizer or Lilly or whomever).
Natural selection is part of evolution, not something completely different and disjoint.
Fair enough, but you wouldn't refer to, say, "offence" to mean "football". "Offence" is certainly a necessary part of "football" -- it is different, though. I mean, there is a substantive difference between that which the word "evolution" refers, and to which the phrase "natural selection" refers. It is not incorrect to say they are distinct.
There's no need to rely on any one person for the penalties for or definition of copyright infringement -- go to the source (or Cornell's helpful pseudo-mirror). I agree with you that there may be penalties for unintended infringement.
I also believe that making available copyrighted materials for distribution probably isn't illegal since there is no law that I know of that makes attempting to infringe a civil or criminal offense.
"Attempt" is not a civil wrong. That is, you can't sue in civil court for "attempted assault" -- you either have an assault, or some other theory. On the flip side, "attempt" can attach to any crime (well, there are probably exceptions that don't immediately jump to mind). There's no need for a statute against "attempted assault" because there's a general definition for "attempt" and another for "assault." In theory, there could be a prosecution "attempted copyright infringement" though I can't immediately think of any set of facts where it would happen in practice.
So saying you'll make a copy for someone isn't illegal. It becomes illegal when you actually make the copy.
I think that statement is true, in the same way that saying you're going to murder someone isn't illegal; you actually have to make a significant step towards the comission of the crime.
That is, of course, one of the main jobs of a jury. The law has spent a few thousand years (as long as there has been law) making determinations as to whether the actions of an individual were on purpose or not. It's not a new problem.
Exactly how are they "welsh[ing] on the agreement that comes with [your] software"? Presumably you chose a particular license under which to release said software. Are they violating that license or breaching a contract? If so, sue them. I imagine you know a few people who would support you in that effort.
If it's a less legally substantial reason that you're displeased, then you're not alone in being a person who did work in good faith, but has discovered that good faith only gets you so far.
Okay, correct me if I'm wrong, but it seems that, to you, only tangible property equals "actual property". That is to say, by your argument, no intangible property could be "actual property".
I just pop a flash-drive in your PC, copy the code on my disk, and run off with that instead. You still have your code. I have not deprived you the use of anything. At worst, I have possibly deprived you of potential profits.
I think a plain reading of the law belies that. 17 USC 106 grants the owner of a copyright the "exclusive right" to certain enumerated rights. While I have my code, I have been deprived of my exclusive rights. What I intended to do with that code is also immaterial.
The one is covered under the first amendment, the other is only covered by copyright law. Our constitution holds that all people have the right to own personal property, but nowhere does it imply that we have the right to profit from IP we hold the copy-right to.
I'm not precisely certain what you mean. What is covered here by the first amendment? Creation of the copyright law is, of course, an explicit power of Congress. The Constitution most certainly recognizes the ability of Congress to grant authors a monopoly on their writings for limited periods for the author's profit (see Article I, section 8 of the US Constitution). The monopoly is intended to allow authors to profit so that they have a motivation to create. At the end of the monopoly, the people gain the work for their own usage.
The purpose of copyright law is to stimulate creativity and innovation, not establish innate rights.
This I agree with you on. The method of stimulation, however, is to grant a limited monopoly so that an author can make money on his or her creation. And as a side note, other countries' laws do recognize copyright as sort of an innate right. France, iirc, has a particularly strong presumption that an artist has certain inherent rights in his or her work. The US doesn't really recognize this, though arguable 17 USC 106A is based on that idea.
This has always been a curious argument to me. All property is like a bundle of rights. For example, you can lease your land to someone else. That person does not have all the rights to the land, but they do possess some rights, even against the true owner.
Or, let's say you have a car. You can sell that car to someone, that is, sell all the rights you possess to that car to someone. You can also transfer something less than all the rights you possess. For example, you could allow someone use of the car for a particular fee, or for a particular period of time.
A copyright is similarly a piece of property. The thing the copyright protects is not tangible, to be sure, but the copyright itself is most certainly property. You can sell it, or you can transfer certain rights that it encompasses.
If you're arguing over nominclature, the word "theft" can be a legally specific term defined in a certain way in a state's criminal code, but that is hardly dispositive of the issue. It might also be "criminal conversion" or "larceny".
In any case, copyright infringement does indeed involve depriving someone of a right granted by law, and that is the exclusive right to copy, distribute, perform, etc. that work (http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/ usc_sec_17_00000106----000-.html). If someone besides the copyright holder performs one of those actions, the copyright holder is deprived of the exclusive right. There are, of course, defenses to violation of that right, just as there are defenses to theft. It does not make it less of a property right.
Actually, if I could make a slight modification -- call the spouses of the owners of these telemarketing companies.
I actually really enjoyed Gametap. Besides Sam & Max, there's most of the King's Quest series, most of the Space Quest series, most of Ultima (the good ones, anyway), Civ 3, Far Cry, Altered Beast, Baldur's Gate I & II, Icewind Dale I & II, Planescape: Torment, Castlevania I-III, Prince of Persia, Contra, and the list goes on.
Now I sound like an ad, which I don't mean to be, but I do think it's a good service with a ton of classic games. Note: I did cancel my subscription, but it was because I wasn't playing any games, not because the game selection was bad.
As I understand it, China doesn't take the hardest line on North Korea because 1) China gets a good deal of trade from NK and more importantly 2) China is concerned about thousands or millions of refugees pouring over their border. Check out a recent Time article at http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1 549298,00.html