And...that would be exactly what I said, that the problem for hardware manufacturers is that new hardware doesn't work out of the box (and whining that that's not fair is stupid, so don't) and that the market share for Linux isn't sufficient to make it worthwhile to target or promote. Are you even reading what I'm saying?
But it always will; people will pay to avoid grind--yet that's how MMOs deliver "content." So if you want to posit a candyland fairy world, go ahead, but the rest of us will discuss based on what actually exists.
That's not a terrible idea, although I think you're underestimating how long it takes an author to write a book (50 times minimum wage for six months is a good whack of money). If I ever end up releasing a piece of closed-source software, I'll probably do something similar: "Once this has sold X copies, I'll release it under the GPL."
Re:Every country has a different threshold
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I mean, even if somebody breaks into my house and tries to steal things away I wouldn't want to shoot a bullet at him...
Someone's invading your home. He might be there to steal your things. He might be there to steal your things and kill you to prevent later identification (that's not unheard-of). Do you cower in the corner and hope that maybe the police come in time to save your bacon, or do you defend yourself and your home? Remember: the police are there to track down the perpetrators of a crime, not prevent it from happening in the first place.
I am well-trained in the use of my personal defense firearm and I have a concealed weapons permit (though I do not use it); the others in my home know what to do if somebody attempts to break in (call 911 and hide under the bed, because they are not trained with a firearm--that's why it's locked in a safe when not in use). I am certain that the residents of my home are more likely to survive a home invasion than in a home without such protection.
You might choose not to do so; that's fine. The idea that others should be stripped of their right to defend themselves because you choose not to do so, however, is preposterous.
Perhaps it's more obvious to me because I know some of them.;-)
And this might surprise you, but of the folks I know who work at Microsoft, I can't think of one who doesn't own a Mac and/or also run Linux. They take note of what works and adapt it.
The people who say "OMG, Windows is unusable, GNOME is so awesome," etc. etc., are doing more harm to their cause than good. The majority of people who claim that GNOME, KDE, or whatever else is great are generally just used to its failings. (I'm including myself in this; for a long time I held up KDE as being absolutely awesome. Then I went back to Windows and realized that both have pluses and minuses, and both have very stark minuses when compared to the other.) The negatives matter far more than the positives, and the developers need to see those negatives because blowjobs over the positives don't improve the product.
I shouldn't feed such a blatant troll but what the hell.
Not a troll. I'm an open-source developer. I just don't drink the kool-aid and I'm willing to admit that we still have work to do.
That would depend on the crowd, most of the people I talk to now have heard of linux even if they don't know what it is. However, most of them don't know what windows is either.
Meaningless statement.
What driver issues? My last two new system builds loaded without the need for additional drivers. Firmware needed to be downloaded to run my wireless adapter properly but Ubuntu helpfully does that for me.
As said so frequently on Linux Hater's Blog, WorksForMe(tm) is not an acceptable answer.
your right, for the most part I've found the popular open source software better than commercial offerings.
Perhaps for you it's easier. For most people, it seems like the popular open source software is vastly inferior. People would rather pay for MS Office than use OpenOffice. People would rather pay for Visio than use Dia. People would rather pay for Photoshop than use The GIMP. If they were inferior, why would this be so?
Yes, the programmers obviously didn't care about what they were doing and the UI is horrible. It actually gets worse with age. The MacOS UI is better but still fails to measure up to Gnome or KDE.
Telling the GNOME and KDE developers feel-good lies like this doesn't help. Echo chambers are bad.
Here's the thing, though: what they have works well enough and, arguably, better for most of them (because Linux, to someone acclimated with Windows or OS X, is horribly unintuitive and unfriendly). Why should they switch to something less useful to them? (Again: free-as-in-freedom and free-as-in-beer are not good answers. End users don't care about freedom in the FSF sense of it and you won't make them care, and Windows is free because they can pirate it.)
You say a lot of stupid shit. I need to start saving my mod points so I can start modding every single posts of yours down as "overrated".
No surprise. "I disagree with what you say, so I don't want you to be heard."
If you have an old business model, and there's a new one that's far better than what you currently have, you need to adapt, or die. Those are your two choices. That's how it always is in business. That's how it always will be. Adapt or die.
Except that it's not a "new model," it's simply a new way for people to break the law. But good try, I'm sure it makes you feel better to say that.
Let me break it down for you using simple words so you are capable of understanding: the product is still being maintained, so an ending copyright is stupid.
What's the alternative, then? Until you provide an alternative that does not screw the creators, your complaints are meaningless.
Re:Every country has a different threshold
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China Blocks iTunes
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I believe you misunderstand. I would rather never need to use a gun. But the ability to do so should not be denied to me in defense of my person and those of others.
As for the purpose of the right to bear arms--that theory you put forth was essentially demolished by Heller v. D.C., as Heller reduced the importance of the militia as opposed to citizens' defense.
Re:Every country has a different threshold
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China Blocks iTunes
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· Score: 1
Those numbers mean absolutely nothing, if only because the size of the area being reduced to those numbers is huge. There hasn't been a homicide in my area in ten, maybe twelve years. There are homicides regularly in some districts of London.
Besides, what's laughable and sad is reducing their rights to offer an illusion of security. But I imagine you knew this, and are trolling.
You're one of very few people willing to admit that they fuck over creators just because you can. I guess you're at least an honest thief, if such is possible.
The street vendor has your business, as you put it, because he's violating the copyright, too. His costs would go up if he was actually paying the cost of production. So should production just...stop? After all, that's how the current creators would reduce their costs--by not producing. Is that what you want?
If that's not what you want, why continue doing what you do?
Obviously some serious thought would have to go in to how long to set copyrights, and there would possible be different standards for different mediums, but this 'life of the author + 70 years' crap is ridiculous.
I don't disagree. I think that fifteen years is more than enough for most work--it's about the effective lifetime of most authors or artists.
As for your artists and authors, well, they would have to adapt or die. We're fond of telling the music industry that the old way of doing business is no longer sustainable, the same would hold true for other areas.
While I dislike the RIAA's business practices, what I say is the same there: you don't have the right to be giving away their copyrighted material, so don't be doing it. The "adapt or die" tripe is peddled by people who wish to rationalize their actions.
But all this is moot, of course. Copyrights will not get shorter, they will continue to get longer as corporations buy-off^H^H^H^H^H^H^H lobby governments to keep control of their respective IPs.
Agreed. As a creator, I'm okay with that. As a consumer, I'm not. The overreactions of the "gut copyright!" crowd threaten my livelihood, however, so I'm a little more pointed with them.:-P
I did read the Gowers Report; I disagree with some of the claims made in it (chiefly among them the failure to take into account the likelihood of people just not buying titles because they know that they'll be free not that far down the line), but more importantly I also wasn't clear enough in my post. Yes, a publisher is profitable off a small number of books. In your publisher's case, three thousand sales is the minimum for the publisher to make a profit. When I talk about books being unprofitable, I'm speaking of profitability for authors. Writing is often very much a full-time job--while there are a lot of authors who can't support themselves off their writing, this is an excellent way to cut out any real chance of it, because residuals from older titles often form a good chunk of any moderately successful writer's income. (And not many authors are becoming rich off their work as it is. Why screw them over further?)
With regards to "The ones that are still selling well after this period..." -- well, why the hell should they be prevented from continuing to profit? Obviously there's still a demand to purchase them--why should this demand be kneecapped? Like I said above, a five-year copyright will do a lot to kill purchases just because it'll be free pretty soon down the line.
Somewhat. I mean to imply that Linux doesn't benefit from the "look, software you don't have to pay for!" effect because the shiny new hardware generally works like shit on it, and there's no real economic reason for hardware manufacturers to go out of their way to support Linux because there are so few users. It's a catch-22, and a thorny one.
Yes, I'm aware of that argument. I give it no credence. The effort was still expended and the workman should be compensated if you wish to avail yourself of his work. (There are also other issues, such as the software's creator issuing patches, etc., which is continuing work on the once-bought product that he's generally not paid for. I personally wouldn't mind seeing copyright on software revoked some period of time after the creator stops maintaining it, perhaps 3-5 years after the last patch/release of the software.)
You know it's not the same thing, so why the silly act?
But it is, in a very real and very important way.
The workman's effort was expended to create that house. The workman's effort was expended to create that software. Why should the programmer not be rewarded for it? (Or are you one of those mouthbreathers who really thinks that a company like Epic is going to write its next Unreal engine based on donations?)
Oh. Almost forgot. "For individuals a bit longer"--well, that still screws over most authors. And corporations will just assign the copyright to the corporation's owner or something similar, and you get the same benefits as an individual. Smooth!
People pay for artists' prints, which while a tangible item are but copies. So we're going to gank them too, right?
What about books? Authors earn royalties off those for years! How DARE they?! (Never mind that a five-year copyright would essentially make most books thoroughly unprofitable--good job killing off what remains of the American market for books!)
Oh, wait. Sorry, I forgot. You do want software you don't have to pay for. The side effects of your desires don't matter, because you don't have to pay for others' work no more and so all is right with the world.:D
I write open-source software, but I still respect creators' rights. And one of those rights is the right to profit from your creation. You want to not have to pay them for it? Then write your own or support those who want to write ones that won't cost you money. Bam, problem solved. But that would require effort, which means that you'll hate the idea. Instead, it'd just be better to fuck over the people who already created what you want. They won't give it to you for free, so obviously they deserve it.
(Software patents, on the other hand, need to die in a fire, because those stifle the ability for others to compete. Not good.)
That doesn't even begin to make sense, I'm afraid.
One: Linux is basically unknown. Yes, we as Slashdotters know about it, and it runs on eight bajillion items, but the end user still remains basically ignorant.
Two: Linux doesn't require upgrades (in fact, it could really be argued that upgrading to the latest and greatest is a really bad thing for a Linux user, what with driver issues and all).
Three: Most of that pirated software won't run on Linux (or requires a bunch of screwing around to get working, hello WINE), so using Linux isn't a plus for people who want to avail themselves of that pirated content.
Open source software isn't the same as getting commercial software for free. As much as some of the gnulots around here would like you to believe, most of the time commercial software is still better--for an end user, although not always (or even often) from a technical perspective. (Just look at Windows versus any of the major Linux DEs. It's pretty obvious that Microsoft has UI experts and programmers who are paid to work with them, as opposed to "scratch your own itch" open source programmers. Nobody can, or should try to, force open source programmers to work on them, but there is a corresponding failure of usability inherent in such.)
Slashdot Mirror
You basically nailed it. Well said, sir.
And...that would be exactly what I said, that the problem for hardware manufacturers is that new hardware doesn't work out of the box (and whining that that's not fair is stupid, so don't) and that the market share for Linux isn't sufficient to make it worthwhile to target or promote. Are you even reading what I'm saying?
But it always will; people will pay to avoid grind--yet that's how MMOs deliver "content." So if you want to posit a candyland fairy world, go ahead, but the rest of us will discuss based on what actually exists.
That's not a terrible idea, although I think you're underestimating how long it takes an author to write a book (50 times minimum wage for six months is a good whack of money). If I ever end up releasing a piece of closed-source software, I'll probably do something similar: "Once this has sold X copies, I'll release it under the GPL."
I wish I could disagree with you.
I mean, even if somebody breaks into my house and tries to steal things away I wouldn't want to shoot a bullet at him...
Someone's invading your home. He might be there to steal your things. He might be there to steal your things and kill you to prevent later identification (that's not unheard-of). Do you cower in the corner and hope that maybe the police come in time to save your bacon, or do you defend yourself and your home? Remember: the police are there to track down the perpetrators of a crime, not prevent it from happening in the first place.
I am well-trained in the use of my personal defense firearm and I have a concealed weapons permit (though I do not use it); the others in my home know what to do if somebody attempts to break in (call 911 and hide under the bed, because they are not trained with a firearm--that's why it's locked in a safe when not in use). I am certain that the residents of my home are more likely to survive a home invasion than in a home without such protection.
You might choose not to do so; that's fine. The idea that others should be stripped of their right to defend themselves because you choose not to do so, however, is preposterous.
Perhaps it's more obvious to me because I know some of them. ;-)
And this might surprise you, but of the folks I know who work at Microsoft, I can't think of one who doesn't own a Mac and/or also run Linux. They take note of what works and adapt it.
The people who say "OMG, Windows is unusable, GNOME is so awesome," etc. etc., are doing more harm to their cause than good. The majority of people who claim that GNOME, KDE, or whatever else is great are generally just used to its failings. (I'm including myself in this; for a long time I held up KDE as being absolutely awesome. Then I went back to Windows and realized that both have pluses and minuses, and both have very stark minuses when compared to the other.) The negatives matter far more than the positives, and the developers need to see those negatives because blowjobs over the positives don't improve the product.
I shouldn't feed such a blatant troll but what the hell.
Not a troll. I'm an open-source developer. I just don't drink the kool-aid and I'm willing to admit that we still have work to do.
That would depend on the crowd, most of the people I talk to now have heard of linux even if they don't know what it is. However, most of them don't know what windows is either.
Meaningless statement.
What driver issues? My last two new system builds loaded without the need for additional drivers. Firmware needed to be downloaded to run my wireless adapter properly but Ubuntu helpfully does that for me.
As said so frequently on Linux Hater's Blog, WorksForMe(tm) is not an acceptable answer.
your right, for the most part I've found the popular open source software better than commercial offerings.
Perhaps for you it's easier. For most people, it seems like the popular open source software is vastly inferior. People would rather pay for MS Office than use OpenOffice. People would rather pay for Visio than use Dia. People would rather pay for Photoshop than use The GIMP. If they were inferior, why would this be so?
Yes, the programmers obviously didn't care about what they were doing and the UI is horrible. It actually gets worse with age. The MacOS UI is better but still fails to measure up to Gnome or KDE.
Telling the GNOME and KDE developers feel-good lies like this doesn't help. Echo chambers are bad.
Here's the thing, though: what they have works well enough and, arguably, better for most of them (because Linux, to someone acclimated with Windows or OS X, is horribly unintuitive and unfriendly). Why should they switch to something less useful to them? (Again: free-as-in-freedom and free-as-in-beer are not good answers. End users don't care about freedom in the FSF sense of it and you won't make them care, and Windows is free because they can pirate it.)
5.6% of the desktop? In what wonderland? [citation] very much [needed], sir.
No, the creator doesn't have a financial incentive to patch and maintain a product unless it didn't work to begin with. If it provides
I love ACs. So very furious and angry, yet completely unable to read a post.
You say a lot of stupid shit. I need to start saving my mod points so I can start modding every single posts of yours down as "overrated".
No surprise. "I disagree with what you say, so I don't want you to be heard."
If you have an old business model, and there's a new one that's far better than what you currently have, you need to adapt, or die. Those are your two choices. That's how it always is in business. That's how it always will be. Adapt or die.
Except that it's not a "new model," it's simply a new way for people to break the law. But good try, I'm sure it makes you feel better to say that.
LOL. Feeding the troll, but what the hell.
Let me break it down for you using simple words so you are capable of understanding: the product is still being maintained, so an ending copyright is stupid.
Get me?
What's the alternative, then? Until you provide an alternative that does not screw the creators, your complaints are meaningless.
I believe you misunderstand. I would rather never need to use a gun. But the ability to do so should not be denied to me in defense of my person and those of others.
As for the purpose of the right to bear arms--that theory you put forth was essentially demolished by Heller v. D.C., as Heller reduced the importance of the militia as opposed to citizens' defense.
Those numbers mean absolutely nothing, if only because the size of the area being reduced to those numbers is huge. There hasn't been a homicide in my area in ten, maybe twelve years. There are homicides regularly in some districts of London.
Besides, what's laughable and sad is reducing their rights to offer an illusion of security. But I imagine you knew this, and are trolling.
You're one of very few people willing to admit that they fuck over creators just because you can. I guess you're at least an honest thief, if such is possible.
The street vendor has your business, as you put it, because he's violating the copyright, too. His costs would go up if he was actually paying the cost of production. So should production just...stop? After all, that's how the current creators would reduce their costs--by not producing. Is that what you want?
If that's not what you want, why continue doing what you do?
Obviously some serious thought would have to go in to how long to set copyrights, and there would possible be different standards for different mediums, but this 'life of the author + 70 years' crap is ridiculous.
I don't disagree. I think that fifteen years is more than enough for most work--it's about the effective lifetime of most authors or artists.
As for your artists and authors, well, they would have to adapt or die. We're fond of telling the music industry that the old way of doing business is no longer sustainable, the same would hold true for other areas.
While I dislike the RIAA's business practices, what I say is the same there: you don't have the right to be giving away their copyrighted material, so don't be doing it. The "adapt or die" tripe is peddled by people who wish to rationalize their actions.
But all this is moot, of course. Copyrights will not get shorter, they will continue to get longer as corporations buy-off^H^H^H^H^H^H^H lobby governments to keep control of their respective IPs.
Agreed. As a creator, I'm okay with that. As a consumer, I'm not. The overreactions of the "gut copyright!" crowd threaten my livelihood, however, so I'm a little more pointed with them. :-P
I did read the Gowers Report; I disagree with some of the claims made in it (chiefly among them the failure to take into account the likelihood of people just not buying titles because they know that they'll be free not that far down the line), but more importantly I also wasn't clear enough in my post. Yes, a publisher is profitable off a small number of books. In your publisher's case, three thousand sales is the minimum for the publisher to make a profit. When I talk about books being unprofitable, I'm speaking of profitability for authors. Writing is often very much a full-time job--while there are a lot of authors who can't support themselves off their writing, this is an excellent way to cut out any real chance of it, because residuals from older titles often form a good chunk of any moderately successful writer's income. (And not many authors are becoming rich off their work as it is. Why screw them over further?)
With regards to "The ones that are still selling well after this period..." -- well, why the hell should they be prevented from continuing to profit? Obviously there's still a demand to purchase them--why should this demand be kneecapped? Like I said above, a five-year copyright will do a lot to kill purchases just because it'll be free pretty soon down the line.
Somewhat. I mean to imply that Linux doesn't benefit from the "look, software you don't have to pay for!" effect because the shiny new hardware generally works like shit on it, and there's no real economic reason for hardware manufacturers to go out of their way to support Linux because there are so few users. It's a catch-22, and a thorny one.
Yes, I'm aware of that argument. I give it no credence. The effort was still expended and the workman should be compensated if you wish to avail yourself of his work. (There are also other issues, such as the software's creator issuing patches, etc., which is continuing work on the once-bought product that he's generally not paid for. I personally wouldn't mind seeing copyright on software revoked some period of time after the creator stops maintaining it, perhaps 3-5 years after the last patch/release of the software.)
You know it's not the same thing, so why the silly act?
But it is, in a very real and very important way.
The workman's effort was expended to create that house. The workman's effort was expended to create that software. Why should the programmer not be rewarded for it? (Or are you one of those mouthbreathers who really thinks that a company like Epic is going to write its next Unreal engine based on donations?)
Oh. Almost forgot. "For individuals a bit longer"--well, that still screws over most authors. And corporations will just assign the copyright to the corporation's owner or something similar, and you get the same benefits as an individual. Smooth!
People pay for artists' prints, which while a tangible item are but copies. So we're going to gank them too, right?
What about books? Authors earn royalties off those for years! How DARE they?! (Never mind that a five-year copyright would essentially make most books thoroughly unprofitable--good job killing off what remains of the American market for books!)
Oh, wait. Sorry, I forgot. You do want software you don't have to pay for. The side effects of your desires don't matter, because you don't have to pay for others' work no more and so all is right with the world. :D
I write open-source software, but I still respect creators' rights. And one of those rights is the right to profit from your creation. You want to not have to pay them for it? Then write your own or support those who want to write ones that won't cost you money. Bam, problem solved. But that would require effort, which means that you'll hate the idea. Instead, it'd just be better to fuck over the people who already created what you want. They won't give it to you for free, so obviously they deserve it.
(Software patents, on the other hand, need to die in a fire, because those stifle the ability for others to compete. Not good.)
That doesn't even begin to make sense, I'm afraid.
One: Linux is basically unknown. Yes, we as Slashdotters know about it, and it runs on eight bajillion items, but the end user still remains basically ignorant.
Two: Linux doesn't require upgrades (in fact, it could really be argued that upgrading to the latest and greatest is a really bad thing for a Linux user, what with driver issues and all).
Three: Most of that pirated software won't run on Linux (or requires a bunch of screwing around to get working, hello WINE), so using Linux isn't a plus for people who want to avail themselves of that pirated content.
Open source software isn't the same as getting commercial software for free. As much as some of the gnulots around here would like you to believe, most of the time commercial software is still better--for an end user, although not always (or even often) from a technical perspective. (Just look at Windows versus any of the major Linux DEs. It's pretty obvious that Microsoft has UI experts and programmers who are paid to work with them, as opposed to "scratch your own itch" open source programmers. Nobody can, or should try to, force open source programmers to work on them, but there is a corresponding failure of usability inherent in such.)