I'm pretty sure that youTube is offering a profit sharing scheme with the content owners I know Revver has revenue sharing with content providers. I know GoogleVideo lets content owners set prices (usually $1.99) for users to pay to access the content. I don't think YouTube or GoogleVideo have figured out how to support ad revenue sharing with the content providers.
That said, this whole discussion misses a key point. Who paid to have the content created? Lorne Michaels and Jon Stewart may have a strong case that they are critical parts of the content creation... but they aren't paying their own salaries, so they can't claim ownership of the end result. Regardless of what is best for the end users, it is ultimately up to the studios who pay for the creation of the content on how the content is distributed.
My arguement for the evolution of media is for content to free itself from its monetary dependancies on the major studios. Fuck Fox and Viacom. Lorne and Jon, pay for your own production and cut ties with the bastards you serve when your contracts expire. We, as the end users, will support you.
And Google, find a way so Lorne and Jon can support themselves while using your services to provide your users with their content for free.
My thought is that the bit about releasing buggy hardware so we can patch it later was a bit of an editorial instigator. All things aside, a well designed general piece of hardware can be a major advantage. There are reasons that might make reprogramable hardware extremely useful. What if you could hit a few buttons and switch your cellphone from CDMA to GSM and use the networks that exist in other parts of the world? What if you could upgrade the Bluetooth in your computer as the standard evolves?
* editor's note: I've got no idea if these examples are feasible, but I can't think of examples of hardware swappability that I _know_ are.
Maybe the US is simply recognizing that our own standards have fallen so low that when a foriegn-born individual comes waving his or her "batchelor's degree", we welcome them with open arms because we are none-the-wiser.
Running TV adverts... bad idea. Producing a show/film about it... better idea. It seems to have marginally worked for Al Gore. His "climate change" agenda is starting to pick up... and he has started this website to gather a grass-roots movement.
In addition to "Incovenient Truth", there is "Loose Change" which discusses the 9/11 attacks.
On the other hand... if you really want to see transparent voting become a reality, head over to the Electronic Voting Machine project which is sponsored by the Open Voting Consortium and contribute.
Note: I am not affiliated with the Open Voting Consortium, and simply searched for "open source voting machine" in Google to give you an idea. I have no idea if they have a grounded ideology towards implementing transparent voting, but they are hosted on SourceForge... so that gives them a bit of street cred.
How would you propose "cranking it to 11"? I figure canceling "24" _and_ "American Idol" would send a shock that reverberates through the country... but short of that anything you did would go unnoticed by the masses.
I agree with you about the benefits of the scientific method, invention, and other things that advance society, but I want to play devil's advocate.
Modern Meds, cars, and the internet... science or business?
During the Black Plague... using science to cure the disease was crucial for survival. These days we have medical companies being accused of the life-long treatment of disease instead of actually finding a cure. These days, it seems everyone worships the power of the holy "buck".
And here's a different tangent...
The internet? Yes, the original Arpanet was a magnificient development - but what it evolved into (the internet) is ubiquitous. My guess would be the 75% of the users of the internet don't even know what Arpanet was (and that is was created as a weapon during the Cold War).
Then again... this article is about how half the country doesn't believe in evolution, so how could Arpanet evolve into the internet?
We've always been at war with East Asia and the internet has always allowed us to post our ignorances to the world.
===
Sorry for jumping around and not staying on topic. I had two different points to make, and couldn't find a good transition.
Just to be clear, I agree that the fact that the RIAA sues people who don't own computers is reprehensible.
> They have the right to go after people that they know are stealing their stuff.
I also agree with this statement, you made. My point was the belief that the majority of the accused have, at one time or another, used a P2P file sharing system to obtain a song that the RIAA holds copyright on to to restrict this free distribution.
My stance on the issue, overall, is to try to ignore artists signed to RIAA member companies and support shows/albums/merch of bands who don't sign with the RIAA and understand that free distribution of digital music is a powerful advertizement for the shows/albums/merch that they can sell to support them while they practice the art they love (i.e. making music).
How could a class action lawsuit of "People vs RIAA" work when the "people" have mostly previously settled with the RIAA? This seems laughable.
The problem is that the majority of the accused are music pirates.
Part of the root of the problem is that there are popular songs out there that are owned by organizations that don't want you to hear the songs unless you pony up the cash. The sad fact is that as a business, the RIAA member organizations are free to pursue judgement regarding their dishonorable copyright contracts because they have bought the rights to these songs.
Whenever an artist sells out to an RIAA member organization, it hurts the culture of music.
Stick to your guns... don't go easy on the small fish in the pond just because they are "doing their job". Doing something that you don't believe in because somebody told you to do it is just as bad as doing something that you believe in that is socially reprehensible.
And doing something for the sake of earning a paycheck? That's just spineless.
I would have to reread the Communist Manifesto to verify whether the two classes (bour/prol) are in existance leading up to the development of a Marxist Communist state or whether they exist within a Marxist Communist state. I don't mean to nit-pick - but the difference is (clearly) significant.
As far as necessarily having a centrally controlled economy, I haven't read Marx's volume entitled, Das Capital - but that's where I would suspect the real details would be. I don't recall the Manifesto discussing the transistion towards Communism. The fact is... for it to work the concept of a classlessness must be embraced by an entire society and greed amongst the members of that society must be destroyed.
Relating back to the topic, by attempting to control the distribution of music the RIAA is being greedy. That is to say... the RIAA is behaving like a capitalist socialism and America's "Democratic" legal system is allowing it.
Frankly, I don't care what political moniker we assign for it... the problem is that music is controlled by corporations which have the bottom line to worry about... AND THAT IS A BAD THING.
And like I said earlier... the answer isn't to fight the RIAA. The answer is to ignore them and the bands who have signed contracts with their member companies. Support bands who embrace culture. When bands find they can earn a living without the (a) recording, (b) distribution, (c) touring/performance access, and (d) promotional services offered by the industry... then the industry will become irrelevant.
Quantum - I'll not sure if your attack is warrented given the fact that it was supposedly the job of the secret police in 1984 to know everything about a person. The phrase from the novel was "thoughtcrime". Big Brother was supposedly able to get children to turn against their parents to expose them of thoughtcrime. This is very similar to colleges turning against their students to expose them to the RIAA of "copyright infringement". Also, video cameras were everywhere. Do you remember the trouble Winston went through in the beginning of the story to find a place where he could be sure he could read a simple note? He certainly was afraid for his life to read it... that's what the RIAA wants us to feel about pirating music.
But your attack on communism from two posts ago was unwarrented. The government was Ingsol, which stood for English Socialism. The tennents of socialism is a state run socio-econmic system. Communism, on the other hand, should be noted for having the characteristic of not having different classes. Your ignorance of this fact points out that you obviously didn't notice how the High Party controlled things and left the Party to *think* they were better off then the other guys (the Proles).
The Party was really just the pawns of the High Party, though. The colleges and their students are just pawns of the RIAA.
Maybe I'm drawing the analogy too far... but recall that Winston hears a Prole singing a tune (Part 2, Chapter 4 - Paragraph 4) and thinking she did it more soulfully than the inhumane system that created it? That's what the RIAA doesn't want.
So what's the answer? Empower artists who don't care whether you download their songs by buying their non-RIAA albums and going to their shows.
You make a good point. Publishing online can be done by any low-life with an agenda.
A respectable scientific publication needs vetting. Why not form a community to do the vetting process and let "expert reviewers" in the field sign off on the quality of a submission? At the end of the article, let the reviewers post their names... and let membership to become a review be by-invitation-only (so not just anybody can sign up).
Could this type of meta-moderating community support the niche that trade journals currently exist to fill?
And while Universities boycot the academic publishing industry and dismiss the work of students who publish in them, the rest of us can boycot the music industry and dismiss the work of artists who haven't realized they can produce and distribute original music without the help of their evil industry.
Kill off those who are dependent on "distributors" to do the easy-part of their job for them (the hard part being actually authoring new, original work).
The emphasis of the GP post was the importance of legal authority of law in the country to be able to rule on even the highest levels of Corporate/Government crime.
Your George W Bush rape scenario is extreme, but falls short of being realistic. What is actually happening to corrupt the moral fiber is dishonsty (Bush tells lies to provoke war / Secret wiretaps that are illegal). The GP states that if the government doesn't need to worry about being honest, why should he?
By your logic, you seem to say that you have tolerance for lies from Bush, but that you would not tolerate lies from Clinton. Frankly, lies from either politician should be met with harsh criticism.
The RIAA won't go away until musical artists stop going to the record companies who form the RIAA to "broadcast" their material. The artists won't stop going to these mafiaa companies until there are other alternatives for them to go to so they can (a) broadcast their music, and (b) earn a living.
That is what the RIAA is defending, and they are doing a damned good job because outside of MySpace and YouTube there are no universal places to reach listeners from... and who honestly uses MySpace or YouTube to discover new music? Those sites are virtual wastelands for content (i.e. lots of content, but little substance).
> If you want to release your books to the public for free you are welcome to do so.
You are "free" as in liberty to publish your own books, but self-publishing isn't "free" as in beer. It takes time (preparation, formatting, etc) and money (ISBN fees, printing costs, binding) to publish a book.
Then again, I have got no idea what the GP is complaining about since it seems he is (a) mad that his Publisher released his work as an eBook, and (b) happy that people have been able to get access to his work and derive some benefit from it. From where I stand, if sales and profit are not the motivation for a project, then who cares how the readership gets access to the material?
But on a serious note, publishing these days is so cheap that "owning a press" is kind of a dumb concept. Go register a domain and stop a blog to bitch about how you hate things. You'd have to be pretty nuts to actually say something on there that would result in any act of censorship... and then things would get real fun, real fast.
it is a good point that you make. i am 75-80% done writing/editing a novel and want to publish it, though i know if i do this through a conventional publish it is high risk. so I've considered self-publishing.
advantage of conventional method? payment up front.
advantage of self-publishing? retain rights.
both not having rights locked up in a publishing house and being paid are hopes of mine. another consideration that is totally unconventional is to setup a paypal so I can receive micro-payments from a potential audience with the promise of releasing by-sa through the Creative Commons. I think that way, everybody wins.
Copyright gives the PUBLISHER whatever rights you are talking about, not that author, as you suggest. Read the notices more closely on the inside cover of a book that is nearby. Does is say "Copyright Joe Johnson" or does is say "Copyright ABC Publishing"?
You must be an XM subscriber... because I doubt anybody who only listens to Howard would care.
That said... I remember a time when Stern was on FM from 6am to 10am and O&A were on the same channel from 2pm to 6pm, before the FCC cracked down on too much of the entertaining sexual content.
During those days, both shows were good. Now, I've got Sirius in the car and tune in to Stern every now and again. I've got my alarm clock to wake me up tuned to O&A's FM broadcast that is syndicated from XM. Frankly... I don't know why XM listeners would allow O&A to degrade themselves so much by pandering to the FCC/Clearchannel regulations. They (O&A) were complaining last week about how they weren't allowed to have nude women in their studio. How outrageous!
What would be more interesting than Howard and O&A on competing platforms is having them on the same non-FCC regulated platform so I can have a free (as in liberty) choice about which brand of raunchy humour I want to listen to.
Simply removing DRM (imho) isn't enough because the songs will still be protected by copyright. If your goal is to own all the music that you purchase from iTunes and be free to copy it to 17 different places, then all you really would only want DRM-free music.
What most people actually want is music that has a free-to-distribute copyright (and nothing that you ever buy on iTunes will ever have that, for obvious reasons).
You insensitive clod! I have taken a stance against DRM and also enjoy watching NFL Football.
Watch out who you pigeon-hole next time.
I fully support your rebuke of American Idol watchers though. Those people are ruining America.
Personally, I run google searches for terms that I know link to pages with adult content that I regularly visit even though I know what the URLs are. This avoids having them remain in the Address bar dropdown that is right there in the middle of the screen, which helps to cover up sites that I wouldn't want others using the same computer to see. Granted, this doesn't clear the browser history... but that requires a bit more digging at for somebody using the same computer to find.
Just cause you "can" type in the URL directly into the Address bar, doesn't mean you want to. =P
Slashdot Mirror
That said, this whole discussion misses a key point. Who paid to have the content created? Lorne Michaels and Jon Stewart may have a strong case that they are critical parts of the content creation... but they aren't paying their own salaries, so they can't claim ownership of the end result. Regardless of what is best for the end users, it is ultimately up to the studios who pay for the creation of the content on how the content is distributed.
My arguement for the evolution of media is for content to free itself from its monetary dependancies on the major studios. Fuck Fox and Viacom. Lorne and Jon, pay for your own production and cut ties with the bastards you serve when your contracts expire. We, as the end users, will support you.
And Google, find a way so Lorne and Jon can support themselves while using your services to provide your users with their content for free.
-Rob
My thought is that the bit about releasing buggy hardware so we can patch it later was a bit of an editorial instigator. All things aside, a well designed general piece of hardware can be a major advantage. There are reasons that might make reprogramable hardware extremely useful. What if you could hit a few buttons and switch your cellphone from CDMA to GSM and use the networks that exist in other parts of the world? What if you could upgrade the Bluetooth in your computer as the standard evolves?
* editor's note: I've got no idea if these examples are feasible, but I can't think of examples of hardware swappability that I _know_ are.
batchelor's degrees? shouldn't this be bachelor's degree?
Maybe the US is simply recognizing that our own standards have fallen so low that when a foriegn-born individual comes waving his or her "batchelor's degree", we welcome them with open arms because we are none-the-wiser.
Running TV adverts... bad idea. Producing a show/film about it... better idea. It seems to have marginally worked for Al Gore. His "climate change" agenda is starting to pick up... and he has started this website to gather a grass-roots movement.
In addition to "Incovenient Truth", there is "Loose Change" which discusses the 9/11 attacks.
On the other hand... if you really want to see transparent voting become a reality, head over to the Electronic Voting Machine project which is sponsored by the Open Voting Consortium and contribute.
Note: I am not affiliated with the Open Voting Consortium, and simply searched for "open source voting machine" in Google to give you an idea. I have no idea if they have a grounded ideology towards implementing transparent voting, but they are hosted on SourceForge... so that gives them a bit of street cred.
How would you propose "cranking it to 11"? I figure canceling "24" _and_ "American Idol" would send a shock that reverberates through the country... but short of that anything you did would go unnoticed by the masses.
I agree with you about the benefits of the scientific method, invention, and other things that advance society, but I want to play devil's advocate.
Modern Meds, cars, and the internet... science or business?
During the Black Plague... using science to cure the disease was crucial for survival. These days we have medical companies being accused of the life-long treatment of disease instead of actually finding a cure. These days, it seems everyone worships the power of the holy "buck".
And here's a different tangent...
The internet? Yes, the original Arpanet was a magnificient development - but what it evolved into (the internet) is ubiquitous. My guess would be the 75% of the users of the internet don't even know what Arpanet was (and that is was created as a weapon during the Cold War).
Then again... this article is about how half the country doesn't believe in evolution, so how could Arpanet evolve into the internet?
We've always been at war with East Asia and the internet has always allowed us to post our ignorances to the world.
===
Sorry for jumping around and not staying on topic. I had two different points to make, and couldn't find a good transition.
Just to be clear, I agree that the fact that the RIAA sues people who don't own computers is reprehensible. > They have the right to go after people that they know are stealing their stuff. I also agree with this statement, you made. My point was the belief that the majority of the accused have, at one time or another, used a P2P file sharing system to obtain a song that the RIAA holds copyright on to to restrict this free distribution. My stance on the issue, overall, is to try to ignore artists signed to RIAA member companies and support shows/albums/merch of bands who don't sign with the RIAA and understand that free distribution of digital music is a powerful advertizement for the shows/albums/merch that they can sell to support them while they practice the art they love (i.e. making music).
How could a class action lawsuit of "People vs RIAA" work when the "people" have mostly previously settled with the RIAA? This seems laughable. The problem is that the majority of the accused are music pirates. Part of the root of the problem is that there are popular songs out there that are owned by organizations that don't want you to hear the songs unless you pony up the cash. The sad fact is that as a business, the RIAA member organizations are free to pursue judgement regarding their dishonorable copyright contracts because they have bought the rights to these songs. Whenever an artist sells out to an RIAA member organization, it hurts the culture of music.
Stick to your guns... don't go easy on the small fish in the pond just because they are "doing their job". Doing something that you don't believe in because somebody told you to do it is just as bad as doing something that you believe in that is socially reprehensible.
And doing something for the sake of earning a paycheck? That's just spineless.
I would have to reread the Communist Manifesto to verify whether the two classes (bour/prol) are in existance leading up to the development of a Marxist Communist state or whether they exist within a Marxist Communist state. I don't mean to nit-pick - but the difference is (clearly) significant. As far as necessarily having a centrally controlled economy, I haven't read Marx's volume entitled, Das Capital - but that's where I would suspect the real details would be. I don't recall the Manifesto discussing the transistion towards Communism. The fact is... for it to work the concept of a classlessness must be embraced by an entire society and greed amongst the members of that society must be destroyed. Relating back to the topic, by attempting to control the distribution of music the RIAA is being greedy. That is to say... the RIAA is behaving like a capitalist socialism and America's "Democratic" legal system is allowing it. Frankly, I don't care what political moniker we assign for it... the problem is that music is controlled by corporations which have the bottom line to worry about... AND THAT IS A BAD THING. And like I said earlier... the answer isn't to fight the RIAA. The answer is to ignore them and the bands who have signed contracts with their member companies. Support bands who embrace culture. When bands find they can earn a living without the (a) recording, (b) distribution, (c) touring/performance access, and (d) promotional services offered by the industry... then the industry will become irrelevant.
Quantum - I'll not sure if your attack is warrented given the fact that it was supposedly the job of the secret police in 1984 to know everything about a person. The phrase from the novel was "thoughtcrime". Big Brother was supposedly able to get children to turn against their parents to expose them of thoughtcrime. This is very similar to colleges turning against their students to expose them to the RIAA of "copyright infringement". Also, video cameras were everywhere. Do you remember the trouble Winston went through in the beginning of the story to find a place where he could be sure he could read a simple note? He certainly was afraid for his life to read it... that's what the RIAA wants us to feel about pirating music.
But your attack on communism from two posts ago was unwarrented. The government was Ingsol, which stood for English Socialism. The tennents of socialism is a state run socio-econmic system. Communism, on the other hand, should be noted for having the characteristic of not having different classes. Your ignorance of this fact points out that you obviously didn't notice how the High Party controlled things and left the Party to *think* they were better off then the other guys (the Proles).
The Party was really just the pawns of the High Party, though. The colleges and their students are just pawns of the RIAA.
Maybe I'm drawing the analogy too far... but recall that Winston hears a Prole singing a tune (Part 2, Chapter 4 - Paragraph 4) and thinking she did it more soulfully than the inhumane system that created it? That's what the RIAA doesn't want.
So what's the answer? Empower artists who don't care whether you download their songs by buying their non-RIAA albums and going to their shows.
And stop being ignorant, you insensitive clod!
You make a good point. Publishing online can be done by any low-life with an agenda. A respectable scientific publication needs vetting. Why not form a community to do the vetting process and let "expert reviewers" in the field sign off on the quality of a submission? At the end of the article, let the reviewers post their names... and let membership to become a review be by-invitation-only (so not just anybody can sign up). Could this type of meta-moderating community support the niche that trade journals currently exist to fill?
And while Universities boycot the academic publishing industry and dismiss the work of students who publish in them, the rest of us can boycot the music industry and dismiss the work of artists who haven't realized they can produce and distribute original music without the help of their evil industry.
Kill off those who are dependent on "distributors" to do the easy-part of their job for them (the hard part being actually authoring new, original work).
The emphasis of the GP post was the importance of legal authority of law in the country to be able to rule on even the highest levels of Corporate/Government crime. Your George W Bush rape scenario is extreme, but falls short of being realistic. What is actually happening to corrupt the moral fiber is dishonsty (Bush tells lies to provoke war / Secret wiretaps that are illegal). The GP states that if the government doesn't need to worry about being honest, why should he? By your logic, you seem to say that you have tolerance for lies from Bush, but that you would not tolerate lies from Clinton. Frankly, lies from either politician should be met with harsh criticism.
The RIAA won't go away until musical artists stop going to the record companies who form the RIAA to "broadcast" their material. The artists won't stop going to these mafiaa companies until there are other alternatives for them to go to so they can (a) broadcast their music, and (b) earn a living.
That is what the RIAA is defending, and they are doing a damned good job because outside of MySpace and YouTube there are no universal places to reach listeners from... and who honestly uses MySpace or YouTube to discover new music? Those sites are virtual wastelands for content (i.e. lots of content, but little substance).
> If you want to release your books to the public for free you are welcome to do so.
You are "free" as in liberty to publish your own books, but self-publishing isn't "free" as in beer. It takes time (preparation, formatting, etc) and money (ISBN fees, printing costs, binding) to publish a book.
Then again, I have got no idea what the GP is complaining about since it seems he is (a) mad that his Publisher released his work as an eBook, and (b) happy that people have been able to get access to his work and derive some benefit from it. From where I stand, if sales and profit are not the motivation for a project, then who cares how the readership gets access to the material?
I like this image showing the rings of Saturn... 4088x2908 pixels large. http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/jpeg/PIA08362.jpg
With more information on these pages:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/multimed ia/pia08362.html
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA08362
> only applies to those that own a press.
Go out and buy a press then.
But on a serious note, publishing these days is so cheap that "owning a press" is kind of a dumb concept. Go register a domain and stop a blog to bitch about how you hate things. You'd have to be pretty nuts to actually say something on there that would result in any act of censorship... and then things would get real fun, real fast.
it is a good point that you make. i am 75-80% done writing/editing a novel and want to publish it, though i know if i do this through a conventional publish it is high risk. so I've considered self-publishing. advantage of conventional method? payment up front. advantage of self-publishing? retain rights. both not having rights locked up in a publishing house and being paid are hopes of mine. another consideration that is totally unconventional is to setup a paypal so I can receive micro-payments from a potential audience with the promise of releasing by-sa through the Creative Commons. I think that way, everybody wins.
Copyright gives the PUBLISHER whatever rights you are talking about, not that author, as you suggest. Read the notices more closely on the inside cover of a book that is nearby. Does is say "Copyright Joe Johnson" or does is say "Copyright ABC Publishing"?
You must be an XM subscriber... because I doubt anybody who only listens to Howard would care. That said... I remember a time when Stern was on FM from 6am to 10am and O&A were on the same channel from 2pm to 6pm, before the FCC cracked down on too much of the entertaining sexual content. During those days, both shows were good. Now, I've got Sirius in the car and tune in to Stern every now and again. I've got my alarm clock to wake me up tuned to O&A's FM broadcast that is syndicated from XM. Frankly... I don't know why XM listeners would allow O&A to degrade themselves so much by pandering to the FCC/Clearchannel regulations. They (O&A) were complaining last week about how they weren't allowed to have nude women in their studio. How outrageous! What would be more interesting than Howard and O&A on competing platforms is having them on the same non-FCC regulated platform so I can have a free (as in liberty) choice about which brand of raunchy humour I want to listen to.
Simply removing DRM (imho) isn't enough because the songs will still be protected by copyright. If your goal is to own all the music that you purchase from iTunes and be free to copy it to 17 different places, then all you really would only want DRM-free music. What most people actually want is music that has a free-to-distribute copyright (and nothing that you ever buy on iTunes will ever have that, for obvious reasons).
You insensitive clod! I have taken a stance against DRM and also enjoy watching NFL Football. Watch out who you pigeon-hole next time. I fully support your rebuke of American Idol watchers though. Those people are ruining America.
Personally, I run google searches for terms that I know link to pages with adult content that I regularly visit even though I know what the URLs are. This avoids having them remain in the Address bar dropdown that is right there in the middle of the screen, which helps to cover up sites that I wouldn't want others using the same computer to see. Granted, this doesn't clear the browser history... but that requires a bit more digging at for somebody using the same computer to find. Just cause you "can" type in the URL directly into the Address bar, doesn't mean you want to. =P
immortal computing... while (1) { cout "Still running..."; }