They may provide a superior service, but they don't make much profit (if any) on it directly. The purpose of the iTMS is to sell music that can be used on iPods, and consequently help iPod sales. If they were a standard music store that sold music for every platform, iPod sales would likely fall as some people would buy cheaper devices or devices with more features that could play their music. If iTunes had to accommodate other platforms, chances are prices would go up to compensate for hardware sales lost to other players.
Why do they need two meters? Couldn't they just charge $1 per unit, but if they have to pay the customer, only pay 30 cents per unit? I don't see why two meters would be necessary.
I'm not concerned about the power companies going bankrupt. If they're smart, they'll adjust their business model, if not they'll start lobbying to make it illegal to generate electricity for your own house (or some similar to prevent from having to change their business model).
The question was about usability. If the decoder just works with XP, but getting it working on Vista takes some time or money, its usability rating will suffer.
You didn't even read my comment, did you? I made a list of APIs that are cross platform and work wonderfully, and you mention WINE in the same category? Wine is okay for people who need to get Windows software to work on another platform, but it's a complete cop-out for someone who writes software. As a sibling said, there are hundreds of cross platform applications. Before I switched from Windows to Ubuntu, the programs I used were Firefox for web browsing, Gaim for instant messaging, OpenOffice for an office suite, Eclipse for software development, VLC for playing videos, iTunes for managing my music and iPod, and Audacity on the rare occasion I need to edit an audio clip. The only one of those I'm not using on Linux is iTunes. Every other program I just mentioned was written using cross-platform APIs. I use GMail and Google Calendar for my e-mail and scheduling needs, and while those aren't running on my computer, they certainly meet the needs of users on different platforms.
Back in the 70's, the climatologists thought the world was going into an ice age. If we had actively tried to prevent an ice age, we could have done something to contribute to global warming, not realizing it was right around the corner anyway. Likewise now, if we try to prevent global warming, without really knowing the causes or what may be around the corner, we may get ourselves into more trouble than we'd have had otherwise.
It may not have happened yet, but it is happening. In the 80's, there were several platforms to develop for, but the cross platform libraries and standards weren't nearly as well developed. Today, there are numerous libraries out there that allow code to either be run directly on different platforms (Java, Python, Perl), or easily compiled for different platforms (QT, GTK+). There are already numerous products that are released on a variety of platforms. Most of the software I use on Linux can simply be compiled for a different CPU architecture, or can be compiled against Cygwin libraries to run on Windows (if not just compiled for Windows). Computers are also cooperating better than they ever have before, as the SMB standard becomes used on Linux and OSX, as well as Windows, and the web begins to replace some past applications.
I don't know what your major objection is to interoperability and standards as opposed to one OS, but to me it seems desirable, and while we've got a ways to go yet, it doesn't seem unachievable.
Where do I mention software user interface design? I specifically used the term "product" to include everything from software to cars.
The point is, right now most technical products are designed by men. Regardless of whether or not there is any actual difference in the product, the fact that a woman designed it / helped design it is going to appeal more to women who had been under the impression that this particular technology was designed by men for men. Publicly involving more women in engineering processes will help to make female consumers feel less alienated by the product.
I guess you think that fraud should be legalized too, since that's just free speech to separate someone from their money by concealing the truth.
That's a pretty big leap. Do you always put words in the mouths of people you disagree with?
The entire point in our freedom of speech was to be able to criticize our government and educate people on issues related to the government. If someone has to register with the current government before criticizing it, that undermines the purpose of the first amendment. If someone lies in order to influence an election, they should (and already can) be held liable. However if the only law they're breaking is that they're not a registered lobbyist, that seriously threatens our first amendment rights, and consequently our Democracy.
Fraud is entirely different. Fraud is lying to take someone's money. Just like lying to influence an election, fraud is illegal, and a person can be held liable to the person they have hurt.
An engineer is a graduate of an engineering school.
I don't know where you're getting your information, but lots of software engineers do come from engineering schools. I am a computer science major, my classes are in the engineering college, and I generally think of myself as an engineering student. My school has a second major, Management Information Systems (MIS), which is in the business college. These students are certainly programmers, but generally wouldn't consider themselves engineers.
I'd point out that your definition of engineer (having to do with an engine) is flawed, but that's been taken care of by sibling posts.
Next time you decide to insult a group of professions, make sure you know what you're talking about.
Or for example, say you wrote a game about stealing cars, and had a section in which players could have detailed sex with prostitutes, but removed all ways to access that part of the game. Then someone comes along with a hack, we'll call it, say, the Hot Cofee mod...
Except that this takes away some of the legitimacy of using the same codecs for free, and gives fewer reasons for media developers/distributors to use open codecs. If you had somewhere you could have paid for it, circumventing the law to get it seems more immoral than if you had to choose between ripping off the codecs and using Windows. Then, once Linux gains a little bit more popularity, media distributors might have started to take into consideration that they can't play wmv files, and if they want those customers, they should use mpeg containers or find a different container. I still think the only people who have anything to worry about as far as copyright infringement are the distributors of w32codecs (and they're generally overseas), but I don't think this is a win for everyone either. It's something like a political party gaining popularity by sacrificing their platform: they may start winning elections, but at this point what does it matter?
Where are you getting this? First, in most states, two 16 year olds having consensual sex is legal, neither party is committing statutory rape. In most of the remaining states, it's some trivial charge that usually leads to counseling sessions, but it's not statutory rape between two people both under the age of consent. There may be a state or two in which both parties could be charged with statutory rape, but saying most states would find both parties guilty of statutory rape is just plain wrong. Furthermore, many states have laws protecting people who are just over the age of consent and having sex with people just under the age of consent. If an 18 year old is having sex with a 15 year old, his charges are going to be fairly trivial, and he generally won't be registering as a sex offender for the rest of his life.
I know this is slashdot, but I wish people would have some idea what they're talking about before they speak with authority on a subject.
Nobody is going to be outright charged for showing friends a Playboy unless somebody's parents strongly object. This is what you call talking down a sentence. Al Capone was put away on tax evasion because they couldn't prove anything else. No prosecutor would take on a charge of just showing someone a Playboy, but they want to get something out of their case when the initial charges don't hold water.
I don't know where you live that's all high and mighty, but I can't imagine you don't have any stupid suits that get through.
I agree. Our country was founded on compromise, and if either party has control of both the legislative and executive branches, no compromises are made and the wants and needs of half the country get tossed aside. With the parties in conflict, things that are essential for our country's well being can still happen, but neither party gets to force their agenda on people without passing it through both parties.
People don't seem to understand what free-speech means. Apple is under no obligation to allow you to post whatever you want on their forums. Simply deleting a post that makes them look bad may not be honest, but they're within their right to do it. Infringing on your free speech would be if they threatened you and said you had to take down a blog post on the issue.
Freedom of speech does not provide a free medium on which to speak, it simply guarantees that you can say what you want without fear of prosecution (so long as what you say isn't libel).
I agree, to a point. I work IT staff one week a year at camp in my state, and I'm constantly having to shake toner cartridges, unjam paper, and do other incredibly basic tasks. Some of the people I help out are incredibly gracious, some even apologetic that I had to come fix their problem. These people usually want to know what they can do to prevent the problem from happening next time.
On the flipside, there are people who get pissed that we didn't give them a printer that won't jam in the first place. They won't attempt to do anything themselves, they just get on the radio and call IT as soon as they have a problem. And they won't let us talk them through the problem on the radio, no matter how simple, they want us to come fix it for them.
They're furious that IT doesn't have our act together, when there are 3 of us, 15 computers, a bar code scanner and printer on each computer, and we get everything from the rental company the day before we're supposed to hand them out, and most of them don't match the specifications we had ordered. And the counselors don't want to know why we're having a problem, they just want us to fix it and fix it now. Then our supervisor gets a bunch of complaints and comes to us, telling us we need to figure out how to make it go more smoothly next year, then won't listen when we make suggestions.
Yes, we in IT get irritated, and probably have bad attitudes, but when people refuse to follow simple instructions (and by simple I mean things like "push this button", "type this number", "make sure it's plugged in"), it's hard to keep being nice.
The moment people bring up a religious reason for something to be in, or out, of public school they should be shown the exit.
I disagree. I would say the moment people bring up a religious reason for something to be in, or out, of the public school science classroom, they should be shown the exit. I think it's quite valid to teach about creationism in, say, a social studies setting, as religion has contributed fairly significantly to the shape of our society, and if students are supposed to be well cultured, it's something they should know. Creationism has no place in a science classroom, (nor, in my opinion, does global warming, which has become more politics than science) but there are appropriate places for those things to be discussed in school.
Repeating the same ol' dKos/DU/lib talking points about how bad the economy is, how bad minimum wage is, etc. will get you no where until you can put some data where your mouth is.
I completely agree with you, but you'd be amazed how many people will ignore data. I frequently find myself giving detailed, well supported data in arguments, only to have it completely ignored by people who know (in their gut) that they're right.
An Inconvenient Truth is politically charged propaganda. There are much more straightforward, less politically charged videos that use better science and fewer dishonest tactics. Teachers ought to be showing something like "Global Warming: What you need to know" with Tom Brokaw, which gets the point across without being deceptive, plus it spends a lot more time talking about practical solutions than Gore's movie. Additionally, Gore's movie is politically charged, so right wing students are going to ignore it just because of the (unnecessary) politics Gore put into the movie, and some left wing students are going to take it for gospel regardless of the science behind it. Brokaw's special is straightforward, unpolitical, and talks about a solution.
Criminal or civil offenses do not matter, and it is irrelevant to make that distinction.
Tell that to a judge. In criminal matters, you have to prove that a crime was committed, or at least attempted. In civil matters, you have to show damages. If you don't actually download a copyrighted song, there aren't damages.
Secondly, I demand my right to shift materials that I've rightfully purchased onto other media. For example, I have a MythTV installation. On it, I have my entire music collection, not to mention a mass of recorded video, and eventually I plan to have my DVD collection ripped as well. DRM means I can no longer do any of these things, which restricts my ability to enjoy the content I've purchased.
The article asked "If digital media was available for sale at a reasonable price, but subject to a DRM scheme that allowed full legitimate usage (format shifting, time shifting, playback on different devices, etc.) and only blocked illicit usage (illegal copying), would you support the usage of such a DRM scheme?" If such a scheme existed, you could still do everything you mention. I agree that current DRM schemes are annoying in that they restrict your usage of products you've paid for, but if all DRM did were enforce the law, I'd hardly say that's being treated like a criminal.
That said, I'm not so naive that I expect such a DRM scheme to ever exist, I'm simply saying that if it did, I wouldn't object to it.
Slashdot Mirror
They may provide a superior service, but they don't make much profit (if any) on it directly. The purpose of the iTMS is to sell music that can be used on iPods, and consequently help iPod sales. If they were a standard music store that sold music for every platform, iPod sales would likely fall as some people would buy cheaper devices or devices with more features that could play their music. If iTunes had to accommodate other platforms, chances are prices would go up to compensate for hardware sales lost to other players.
I'm not concerned about the power companies going bankrupt. If they're smart, they'll adjust their business model, if not they'll start lobbying to make it illegal to generate electricity for your own house (or some similar to prevent from having to change their business model).
The question was about usability. If the decoder just works with XP, but getting it working on Vista takes some time or money, its usability rating will suffer.
You didn't even read my comment, did you? I made a list of APIs that are cross platform and work wonderfully, and you mention WINE in the same category? Wine is okay for people who need to get Windows software to work on another platform, but it's a complete cop-out for someone who writes software. As a sibling said, there are hundreds of cross platform applications. Before I switched from Windows to Ubuntu, the programs I used were Firefox for web browsing, Gaim for instant messaging, OpenOffice for an office suite, Eclipse for software development, VLC for playing videos, iTunes for managing my music and iPod, and Audacity on the rare occasion I need to edit an audio clip. The only one of those I'm not using on Linux is iTunes. Every other program I just mentioned was written using cross-platform APIs. I use GMail and Google Calendar for my e-mail and scheduling needs, and while those aren't running on my computer, they certainly meet the needs of users on different platforms.
Back in the 70's, the climatologists thought the world was going into an ice age. If we had actively tried to prevent an ice age, we could have done something to contribute to global warming, not realizing it was right around the corner anyway. Likewise now, if we try to prevent global warming, without really knowing the causes or what may be around the corner, we may get ourselves into more trouble than we'd have had otherwise.
I don't know what your major objection is to interoperability and standards as opposed to one OS, but to me it seems desirable, and while we've got a ways to go yet, it doesn't seem unachievable.
The point is, right now most technical products are designed by men. Regardless of whether or not there is any actual difference in the product, the fact that a woman designed it / helped design it is going to appeal more to women who had been under the impression that this particular technology was designed by men for men. Publicly involving more women in engineering processes will help to make female consumers feel less alienated by the product.
The entire point in our freedom of speech was to be able to criticize our government and educate people on issues related to the government. If someone has to register with the current government before criticizing it, that undermines the purpose of the first amendment. If someone lies in order to influence an election, they should (and already can) be held liable. However if the only law they're breaking is that they're not a registered lobbyist, that seriously threatens our first amendment rights, and consequently our Democracy.
Fraud is entirely different. Fraud is lying to take someone's money. Just like lying to influence an election, fraud is illegal, and a person can be held liable to the person they have hurt.
Even if this passes, I can't imagine a judge would uphold it in court.
I'd point out that your definition of engineer (having to do with an engine) is flawed, but that's been taken care of by sibling posts.
Next time you decide to insult a group of professions, make sure you know what you're talking about.
Or for example, say you wrote a game about stealing cars, and had a section in which players could have detailed sex with prostitutes, but removed all ways to access that part of the game. Then someone comes along with a hack, we'll call it, say, the Hot Cofee mod...
Except that this takes away some of the legitimacy of using the same codecs for free, and gives fewer reasons for media developers/distributors to use open codecs. If you had somewhere you could have paid for it, circumventing the law to get it seems more immoral than if you had to choose between ripping off the codecs and using Windows. Then, once Linux gains a little bit more popularity, media distributors might have started to take into consideration that they can't play wmv files, and if they want those customers, they should use mpeg containers or find a different container. I still think the only people who have anything to worry about as far as copyright infringement are the distributors of w32codecs (and they're generally overseas), but I don't think this is a win for everyone either. It's something like a political party gaining popularity by sacrificing their platform: they may start winning elections, but at this point what does it matter?
I know this is slashdot, but I wish people would have some idea what they're talking about before they speak with authority on a subject.
I don't know where you live that's all high and mighty, but I can't imagine you don't have any stupid suits that get through.
I agree. Our country was founded on compromise, and if either party has control of both the legislative and executive branches, no compromises are made and the wants and needs of half the country get tossed aside. With the parties in conflict, things that are essential for our country's well being can still happen, but neither party gets to force their agenda on people without passing it through both parties.
Freedom of speech does not provide a free medium on which to speak, it simply guarantees that you can say what you want without fear of prosecution (so long as what you say isn't libel).
On the flipside, there are people who get pissed that we didn't give them a printer that won't jam in the first place. They won't attempt to do anything themselves, they just get on the radio and call IT as soon as they have a problem. And they won't let us talk them through the problem on the radio, no matter how simple, they want us to come fix it for them.
They're furious that IT doesn't have our act together, when there are 3 of us, 15 computers, a bar code scanner and printer on each computer, and we get everything from the rental company the day before we're supposed to hand them out, and most of them don't match the specifications we had ordered. And the counselors don't want to know why we're having a problem, they just want us to fix it and fix it now. Then our supervisor gets a bunch of complaints and comes to us, telling us we need to figure out how to make it go more smoothly next year, then won't listen when we make suggestions.
Yes, we in IT get irritated, and probably have bad attitudes, but when people refuse to follow simple instructions (and by simple I mean things like "push this button", "type this number", "make sure it's plugged in"), it's hard to keep being nice.
Yes, anyone can sign up if you have a cell phone to receive a text message, but some people still don't, meaning they'll need an invite.
An Inconvenient Truth is politically charged propaganda. There are much more straightforward, less politically charged videos that use better science and fewer dishonest tactics. Teachers ought to be showing something like "Global Warming: What you need to know" with Tom Brokaw, which gets the point across without being deceptive, plus it spends a lot more time talking about practical solutions than Gore's movie. Additionally, Gore's movie is politically charged, so right wing students are going to ignore it just because of the (unnecessary) politics Gore put into the movie, and some left wing students are going to take it for gospel regardless of the science behind it. Brokaw's special is straightforward, unpolitical, and talks about a solution.
That said, I'm not so naive that I expect such a DRM scheme to ever exist, I'm simply saying that if it did, I wouldn't object to it.