Not that it's Slashdotted or anything, I just thought it'd be funny.
---
The Investor Relations Web Report calls it "the new plagiarism". Dan Zarella from Puritan City call those who engage in it "the best plagiarists". Others simply call them bloggers or, as Zarella also put it, "Human Aggregators".
They're a new breed of content users that walk a gray area between that which is clearly fair use and what is obviously content theft. Their blogs are marked with large swaths of block quotes and heavy content reuse, but also proper attribution and at least some original content.
These sites, as they've grown in number, have created a great deal of controversy among bloggers who are left to wonder if they are nothing more than content thieves in disguise.
Block quotes by the Dozen
These sites, which for this article I'll simply call "gray", are generally identified by a large number of very short posts, with much of it in block quotes or otherwise directly lifted content. Though they meticulously credit their sources, bowing to more traditional rules for blog attribution, and work to add at least some original content, usually over half of their material comes from other sources.
This has caused many bloggers to worry that these grey blogs might be trying to get away with content theft under the guise of legitimate attribution. The idea being that they can create a much larger volume of content if they only have to write a small portion of it. Users will simply visit the gray blogs since they are able to provide so much more information and, due to the use of liberal quoting, the user will then have no reason to visit the original source. After all, they already have most of the critical information.
While certainly grey blogs don't pose the same threat or raise the same concerns as spam blogs and other content scrapers, the cause for concern is clear. Even though blogging is about sharing and reusing information, excessive sharing threatens the authors penning the original content. The tale of the goose laying the golden egg springs to mind as, quite simply, greed can be the blogging world's biggest enemy.
A Separation of Degrees
What makes this issue so difficult to address, and so difficult to write about, is that it's not so much about gray blogs, but rather, various shades of grey blogs. The difference between someone simply quoting blogs and someone trying to tweak the system is not a clear cut matter, but a separation of degrees.
Quoting, even liberal quoting, is expected by blogs. It's a part of researching a story and covering ongoing stories as well as sharing information. If done properly, it can not only be used to create a new work, but also drive valuable traffic to the original site. In the blogging world, being the source is often a badge of honor.
However, basing your entire site, or even a larger percentage of it, on quoted content is viewed differently. Being a source in a larger article is one thing, but having your content be the majority of the article on another site another. What distinguishes one from the other is unclear at best. There are no math formulas or systems for determining what is right or what is too much.
More confusing still, everyone has a different idea of what constitutes content theft. With Creative Commons Licenses being very common, it's obvious some feel that copying an entire work is acceptable so long as attribution is affixed. Others would place the boundary well within what is usually considered fair use.
The challenge becomes to strike a balance and set some kind of guideline that is compatible with copyright law, acceptable under the current code of blogging ethics but also able to appease the concerns many bloggers share over grey sites.
A Proposed Solution
When I first looked at the problem, I was tempted to set guidelines by which a blogger should not get more than X percent of their overall content from other sites or use more than Y lines from another entry.
"But I am guessing the patent in question might have been applied for years ago."
Patent No. 6,928,433 was filed in January 2001. Before the iPod was unveiled in October.
The site isn't available at the moment (Maximum number of users has been reached.) but it looked like a fairly typical old-method-but-for-new-technology patent. You know the type... "auction bidding... but on the Internet!".
"You got a game machine and a DVD player for $350 (I forget the exact launch price). Now, this same model is being applied to a technology where only something like 1 in 20 people can really use."
You're kind of missing the point. If you have a PS3, and therefore a Blu-Ray player... will the next movie you buy be a DVD or a Blu-Ray? If they cost about the same, why not get the HD movie? After all, you might get a HD TV one day.
And when prices come down on HD-DVD and Blu-Ray and you decide to splurge on a dedicated player, why not pick the Blu-Ray? After all you already have some movies for it.
"Honestly, if you had the choice between the PS3, Xbox 360, and Wii for your kids...well, I sure as hell wouldn't choose the one that costs more than the other two combined."
Parents will choose whatever completes this sentence in their household:
"But mooo-ooom! I WANT a !"
"[How long] until fusion power can be put into production? I know a lot of advances have been made in the last few years, small scale fusion using pyroelectric crystals and such, but really how far are we from the goal? Can anyone in the know comment?"
I know its pretty unreasonable to ask "when is technology x coming out," but a rough order of magnitude (are we talking 10 years? 100?) has got to be doable."
Depends on how much money gets thrown at it. If ITER shows promise, and there's really no technical reason it shouldn't do what they expect, these projects will get more funding and it'll be a matter of decades. France and Japan will be along for the PR alone, which means China and the US will have play as well to save face. This could very well turn out to be the next Space Race. With ITER in 10 years, I'd guess commercial plants (likely government funded or subsidised) within 25. I expect to see it in my lifetime.
"Also, if we do get large scale fusion, is it really going to be cleaner and safer than modern fission plants?"
Yes and no. You'll still get a lot of low-level radioactive waste that's not especially dangerous, but you don't get anything that needs to be stored securely for thousands of years. You might still need to store it away for as much as 50-100 years, but on that time-scale it's basically just warehousing, and it'll be mostly harmless long before that.
It'll be safer because you cannot get a meltdown. Unlike fission power plants, you can cut off the fuel supply. If something goes wrong the plasma will dissipate. A fusion reaction is difficult to start and maintain, whereas a fission reaction is difficult to halt. If something goes horribly wrong, at MOST you'll need to replace parts of the tokamak. The fuel is toxic, but that's a negligable hurdle.
A big plus you didnt mention is the fuel. We can't make uranium. We can create tritium/deuterium without too much hassle. It won't run out.
Another big one is that it can't be weaponised. It won't even produce the radioactive waste needed to make a decent dirty bomb.
"Let's see, 400 seconds - 28.6 seconds.... works out to about 50 years."
Wow, I've seen some bad math before but jeez...
400 seconds - 28.6 seconds works out to 371.4 seconds
You think it's LESS astonishing if the universe did have a beginning and therefore was preceded by an incomprehensible nothingness? And not nothingness as in being empty, but being completely devoid of space and time.
At the very least that's equally mind-boggling.
"Apple needs to do something. The iPod gravytrain is coming to an end as the massive drop in iPod sales shows."
I think it's a bit early to draw that conclusion, I think it's more likely that the iPod sales just had a massive spike during the christmas shopping season. There was an extreme jump in sales last quarter, and if an extraordinarily large number of people were given iPods for christmas, they don't need to buy one the following quarter.
Slashdot Mirror
Not that it's Slashdotted or anything, I just thought it'd be funny.
---
The Investor Relations Web Report calls it "the new plagiarism". Dan Zarella from Puritan City call those who engage in it "the best plagiarists". Others simply call them bloggers or, as Zarella also put it, "Human Aggregators".
They're a new breed of content users that walk a gray area between that which is clearly fair use and what is obviously content theft. Their blogs are marked with large swaths of block quotes and heavy content reuse, but also proper attribution and at least some original content.
These sites, as they've grown in number, have created a great deal of controversy among bloggers who are left to wonder if they are nothing more than content thieves in disguise.
Block quotes by the Dozen
These sites, which for this article I'll simply call "gray", are generally identified by a large number of very short posts, with much of it in block quotes or otherwise directly lifted content. Though they meticulously credit their sources, bowing to more traditional rules for blog attribution, and work to add at least some original content, usually over half of their material comes from other sources.
This has caused many bloggers to worry that these grey blogs might be trying to get away with content theft under the guise of legitimate attribution. The idea being that they can create a much larger volume of content if they only have to write a small portion of it. Users will simply visit the gray blogs since they are able to provide so much more information and, due to the use of liberal quoting, the user will then have no reason to visit the original source. After all, they already have most of the critical information.
While certainly grey blogs don't pose the same threat or raise the same concerns as spam blogs and other content scrapers, the cause for concern is clear. Even though blogging is about sharing and reusing information, excessive sharing threatens the authors penning the original content. The tale of the goose laying the golden egg springs to mind as, quite simply, greed can be the blogging world's biggest enemy.
A Separation of Degrees
What makes this issue so difficult to address, and so difficult to write about, is that it's not so much about gray blogs, but rather, various shades of grey blogs. The difference between someone simply quoting blogs and someone trying to tweak the system is not a clear cut matter, but a separation of degrees.
Quoting, even liberal quoting, is expected by blogs. It's a part of researching a story and covering ongoing stories as well as sharing information. If done properly, it can not only be used to create a new work, but also drive valuable traffic to the original site. In the blogging world, being the source is often a badge of honor.
However, basing your entire site, or even a larger percentage of it, on quoted content is viewed differently. Being a source in a larger article is one thing, but having your content be the majority of the article on another site another. What distinguishes one from the other is unclear at best. There are no math formulas or systems for determining what is right or what is too much.
More confusing still, everyone has a different idea of what constitutes content theft. With Creative Commons Licenses being very common, it's obvious some feel that copying an entire work is acceptable so long as attribution is affixed. Others would place the boundary well within what is usually considered fair use.
The challenge becomes to strike a balance and set some kind of guideline that is compatible with copyright law, acceptable under the current code of blogging ethics but also able to appease the concerns many bloggers share over grey sites.
A Proposed Solution
When I first looked at the problem, I was tempted to set guidelines by which a blogger should not get more than X percent of their overall content from other sites or use more than Y lines from another entry.
Basically:
This generation goal: Achieve fusion.
Next generation goal: Sustained break-even energy output.
I agree. Dealing with leaks definitely calls for depends.
The low-end one doesn't have a DVD burner. Which seems a bit stingy.
The black colour will add $150 to the cost of the same machine.
Patent No. 6,928,433 was filed in January 2001. Before the iPod was unveiled in October.
The site isn't available at the moment (Maximum number of users has been reached.) but it looked like a fairly typical old-method-but-for-new-technology patent. You know the type... "auction bidding... but on the Internet!".
You're kind of missing the point. If you have a PS3, and therefore a Blu-Ray player... will the next movie you buy be a DVD or a Blu-Ray? If they cost about the same, why not get the HD movie? After all, you might get a HD TV one day.
And when prices come down on HD-DVD and Blu-Ray and you decide to splurge on a dedicated player, why not pick the Blu-Ray? After all you already have some movies for it.
Sony gets paid every step of the way.
"Honestly, if you had the choice between the PS3, Xbox 360, and Wii for your kids...well, I sure as hell wouldn't choose the one that costs more than the other two combined." Parents will choose whatever completes this sentence in their household: "But mooo-ooom! I WANT a !"
10^10 in binary would be 2^2 in decimal, which equals 4. So it should be 10^10 = 100 "10^2 = 4" isn't binary, since binary doesn't have 2s or 4s.
I know its pretty unreasonable to ask "when is technology x coming out," but a rough order of magnitude (are we talking 10 years? 100?) has got to be doable."
Depends on how much money gets thrown at it. If ITER shows promise, and there's really no technical reason it shouldn't do what they expect, these projects will get more funding and it'll be a matter of decades. France and Japan will be along for the PR alone, which means China and the US will have play as well to save face. This could very well turn out to be the next Space Race. With ITER in 10 years, I'd guess commercial plants (likely government funded or subsidised) within 25. I expect to see it in my lifetime.
"Also, if we do get large scale fusion, is it really going to be cleaner and safer than modern fission plants?"
Yes and no. You'll still get a lot of low-level radioactive waste that's not especially dangerous, but you don't get anything that needs to be stored securely for thousands of years. You might still need to store it away for as much as 50-100 years, but on that time-scale it's basically just warehousing, and it'll be mostly harmless long before that.
It'll be safer because you cannot get a meltdown. Unlike fission power plants, you can cut off the fuel supply. If something goes wrong the plasma will dissipate. A fusion reaction is difficult to start and maintain, whereas a fission reaction is difficult to halt. If something goes horribly wrong, at MOST you'll need to replace parts of the tokamak. The fuel is toxic, but that's a negligable hurdle.
A big plus you didnt mention is the fuel. We can't make uranium. We can create tritium/deuterium without too much hassle. It won't run out.
Another big one is that it can't be weaponised. It won't even produce the radioactive waste needed to make a decent dirty bomb.
"Let's see, 400 seconds - 28.6 seconds .... works out to about 50 years."
Wow, I've seen some bad math before but jeez...
400 seconds - 28.6 seconds works out to 371.4 seconds
If the survey said "Pick A or B", the remainder is 0.
...
"It makes you wonder how good the research is when the can't get the basic maths right!"
88% is "About nine out of 10". Which is what the quote in your post said.
"these won't work with most hearing aids, thereby limiting their potential audience."
Please. They're limiting their potential customer base to the 99% of the population who:
1. Don't have hearing aids.
and
2. Would use headsets.
Financial suicide, that is.
You think it's LESS astonishing if the universe did have a beginning and therefore was preceded by an incomprehensible nothingness? And not nothingness as in being empty, but being completely devoid of space and time. At the very least that's equally mind-boggling.
(Score:2 Redundant)
Now -that's- funny.
Laws don't get repealed. They only need to win once.
Going after an all-or-nothing market is always risky. And I'd wager Apple and Intel have the low-end graphics chip supply set up for years to come.
In which Mac computer would you put this -budget- graphics card?
The only one you CAN put a new graphics card in is the high-end $2000+ Power Macs.
Developing Mac drivers for this would be a waste of money. There's no market.
"Intel is run by marketdroids, AMD by engineers. Who would you put your money in?"
I'd put my money in Intel.
But I'd buy AMD products.
A decent product well marketed will earn more money than a good product badly marketed.
Off the top of my head:
Linux to BSD: "Don't have a COW, Man!"
Linus UnMOOved by COW.
Penguin: Demon COW Dog.
I think it's a bit early to draw that conclusion, I think it's more likely that the iPod sales just had a massive spike during the christmas shopping season. There was an extreme jump in sales last quarter, and if an extraordinarily large number of people were given iPods for christmas, they don't need to buy one the following quarter.
Wikipedia iPod sales graph.
My magic 8-ball predicts... 9.5M-10.5M units sold in Q3 2006 (from 8.5M in Q2).
G clef?
Doesn't quite roll off the tongue.