Oh please, market scarcity? As in, "You can only buy music, you can't get it free"? Yeah, because it's illegal to protect your market from piracy and robbery. The *AA, as you call them, are industry associations that work to protect their industry. Of COURSE they're run by companies - that's how they were founded to be run; it's why they exist.
The RIAA is a voluntary association of mostly big fish whose members naturally compete with the little fish as well as with each other. They aren't a cartel, and they sure aren't DeBeers. The RIAA is looking out for industry interests. A rising tide floats all boats, the old saying goes, and the RIAA just tries to make sure that the tide stays in. Who stays afloat, though, is another story. But creating scarcity? No; if they were going to create scarcity, they would operate more like a cartel and edge out indie labels and artists. The market forces going against them are found in the radio and broadcasting corporations, which are unaffiliated with the *AA. And in the movie business, the rise of indie films as viable and the existence of arthouse movie theaters means there is no artificial scarcity. Stop fear-mongering and buying into someone else's doomsday conspiracies.
I dunno what pages you were on, but a four-year-old computer had no problems on about 20 pages I checked. The designs are hellish, but certainly not enough to pull firefox to its knees.
Then again, maybe that's because I adblock the music and hostblock the ads...
And yet, the women saying porn in any form is offensive, demeaning, and promotes sexual violence aren't showing up on/.
A law that doesn't quite fit the leftist libertarianism you hold dear is not enough to make it comparable to a country that starves its people intentionally to support a backwards Stalinist regime or to a nation that thinks it's ok to promote the wanton murder of those that do not share the same faith.
Yeah, laws limiting the distribution of porn is really comparable.
I think it's just how it was worded, that the rover crawled back to the lander after it lost contact with it. Then I thought of robot ethics - did Sojourner return to the lander out of a programmed feeling of need or loneliness, or did it simply return because it wanted to know what to do next?
I suppose my problem with the comment (and I did have a problem) was the assumption that the people doing the uploading were idiots and playing with the rovers like they were a sandbox. It is safe to assume that the software has gone through testing already to ensure that it won't screw up the rovers so badly they get lost. On top, the saying you sited, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it," implies that once you've "fixed" it you can't go back to how it was. Software is different in that you can make a backup and restore it to the previous state, especially if the original software was non-mission critical in the first place.
In this last post, you assume that this extra time is begging to be utilized and they don't have a full schedule already. That's a load of hooey and you know it: the science teams have been clammering to get their experiments done. The software team isn't playing with the rovers - they know how dumb that is, just like you do.
Oh please. You were doing so well - outlining the political upside for companies to have regulations - but you followed through with the same old whatever about the poverty of sense in the US government. What you didn't say was the political upside to having rules is that they give the public something they can rely upon, increasing consumer confidence in a dangerous and incredibly fragile industry. Don't forget that if SpaceShipTwo blows up on one of its commercial flights, that could be the end of not just Virgin, but the entire space tourism industry. Regulations aren't always bad, and the political upside is in PR, not liability protection.
Problems still arise with bias, but generally they arise in some of the less travelled articles where individuals can cut what they don't like. For example, the article on the Laurentian Leadership Centre, where I happen to be right now, was expanded upon by one of the students. Another editor simply didn't like the host school and cut it back considerably (although it looks like the proper edits are back), censoring what he didn't like and creating a bias. It's like the plagiarism thing a while back - quality decreases when traffic decreases, but that's the nature of a Wiki project, I suppose.
Try asking those same foreigners about another country - China, say, if you're in France, or Germany if you're in Japan. Odds are, they won't know much about the history of those countries because knowing about them doesn't play into one's everyday life to nearly the same degree. Our elections get global coverage, while Italian elections get maybe a story or two. Better yet, ask Canadians about their history. They know more about Canada than the average American, but a goodly chunk never even know about their first prime minister (Sir John A. MacDonald, if you're wondering).
People learn about America because it's useful, not because they're better cultured.
Yeah.... no. California has a partially direct democracy and it makes the state nearly ungovernable. The Teacher's Union can say "Think of the children!" when demanding a guarunteed wage hike be written into the state Constitution. Then it is. Only 30% of the income from taxpayers is actually available to the State Legislature to move about, making the solving of budget deficits nigh impossible. It is... well, bad. On top of that, I'm a political science student and even I find voting a chore. I have something like 15 bills to research and vote on for this next election, some of which are incredibly stupid (put GPS trackers on sex offenders for the rest of their lives), some of which aren't but incur about $37 billion in debt when the state's credit rating already sucks.
What if I were just an average Joe that didn't have the time or inclination to read through my Voter's Guide and check the internet for news articles? What if all I got for information were the crappy little issue ads put out by the special interest groups? California is run by the populist unions and special interest groups that write their platforms into the Constitution through direct democracy initiatives.
No, I dislike Direct Democracy, however much I like the concept.
I'm surprised that you've been as far afield as Malawi's more medieval areas and not realized that not all poor regions are like that. In the Sahel, cell phones are sometimes used to help coordinate the cattle migrations. In the cities, people do their banking and their bartering, they check the weather, check the prices of food, all on cell phones. Proper computers would probably go even further in helping people lift themselves out of poverty. I'm sure that if you gave the villagers in the place you visited a radio even, they'd learn a great deal to help them out. Give them a computer and the means to get it powered and online and they'd catch on, with training.
I think you're underestimating the people and the technology while overestimating the depth of their isolation.
It's British legalese - anti-social behavior is code for bratty and/or obnoxious kids. It disturbed me too, although more that the enforcement of the law had drifted so far from the spirit of the law than anything else. Enforcement against anti-social behavior is highly subjective, after all, and thus requies a police department to train officers to recognize the difference between a bratty kid and a belligerent neighbor.
I suppose it wouldn't help to tell you that the income gap in European nanny states is lower (quite lower) than it is in the US. Giving cash to the poor probably isn't what does it, though - it's probably the investment in infrastructure to help the poor, things like national healthcare, free or cheap university, job centres, housing, and so on.
Odds are though, if we cut out NASA's budget, it would probably get rolled into the Pentagon's budget. Pitty, that.
Well, Maxis has always been about the "software toys," games with no clear end and with mainly user-set goals. I've often wanted to see the various games stitched together, like SimLife, SimEarth and SimCity. I think people still play the Sims because it really is more of a toy than a game (with most of the interactions being common-sense, i.e., don't make out with someone in front of your spouse). The question remains, though, if Spore will appeal to that same sort of common-sense, or if it will require too much thought for the average human.
Way to jump to a conclusion there. Companies already have record retention legislation governing them, so that 'Big Brother' knows who imported what when, who ordered what, and so on. In fact, companies even keep your credit card numbers on file! Although that's not government accessible, the other stuff is. If you've ordered something in the last five years from a company, you bet your ass it's on record. I just spent my past week filing all that stuff away.
It's not a breach of privacy, it's company records that I'm honestly surprised Myspace doesn't have. And besides, if you're looking for predators, you can't just look where the prey has been.
1. Not at all remotely connected to the topic 2. Stop plagiarising 3. Personal experience and a heartwarming tale do not make science or ethical norms, although they do make the reddest of herrings
The problem stems not from capitalism but how loud various groups are. The two things that amplify a group's concerns are membership and money. Since groups lobbying for tight IP laws generally have a great deal more money than lobbyist groups advocating liberal IP laws have members, they have a louder voice and so get their arguments across more fully to government officials.
Perhaps a/. PAC would help to turn the tide because, y'know, we love to bitch about it so much.
Slashdot Mirror
Oh please, market scarcity? As in, "You can only buy music, you can't get it free"? Yeah, because it's illegal to protect your market from piracy and robbery. The *AA, as you call them, are industry associations that work to protect their industry. Of COURSE they're run by companies - that's how they were founded to be run; it's why they exist.
The RIAA is a voluntary association of mostly big fish whose members naturally compete with the little fish as well as with each other. They aren't a cartel, and they sure aren't DeBeers. The RIAA is looking out for industry interests. A rising tide floats all boats, the old saying goes, and the RIAA just tries to make sure that the tide stays in. Who stays afloat, though, is another story. But creating scarcity? No; if they were going to create scarcity, they would operate more like a cartel and edge out indie labels and artists. The market forces going against them are found in the radio and broadcasting corporations, which are unaffiliated with the *AA. And in the movie business, the rise of indie films as viable and the existence of arthouse movie theaters means there is no artificial scarcity. Stop fear-mongering and buying into someone else's doomsday conspiracies.
I dunno what pages you were on, but a four-year-old computer had no problems on about 20 pages I checked. The designs are hellish, but certainly not enough to pull firefox to its knees.
Then again, maybe that's because I adblock the music and hostblock the ads...
And yet, the women saying porn in any form is offensive, demeaning, and promotes sexual violence aren't showing up on /.
A law that doesn't quite fit the leftist libertarianism you hold dear is not enough to make it comparable to a country that starves its people intentionally to support a backwards Stalinist regime or to a nation that thinks it's ok to promote the wanton murder of those that do not share the same faith.
Yeah, laws limiting the distribution of porn is really comparable.
Yeah, the act has been around for two years, but it's still kicking. I think I'm going to write an angry letter to Diane Feinstein('s staffers).
I think it's just how it was worded, that the rover crawled back to the lander after it lost contact with it. Then I thought of robot ethics - did Sojourner return to the lander out of a programmed feeling of need or loneliness, or did it simply return because it wanted to know what to do next?
I suppose my problem with the comment (and I did have a problem) was the assumption that the people doing the uploading were idiots and playing with the rovers like they were a sandbox. It is safe to assume that the software has gone through testing already to ensure that it won't screw up the rovers so badly they get lost. On top, the saying you sited, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it," implies that once you've "fixed" it you can't go back to how it was. Software is different in that you can make a backup and restore it to the previous state, especially if the original software was non-mission critical in the first place.
In this last post, you assume that this extra time is begging to be utilized and they don't have a full schedule already. That's a load of hooey and you know it: the science teams have been clammering to get their experiments done. The software team isn't playing with the rovers - they know how dumb that is, just like you do.
Oh please. You were doing so well - outlining the political upside for companies to have regulations - but you followed through with the same old whatever about the poverty of sense in the US government. What you didn't say was the political upside to having rules is that they give the public something they can rely upon, increasing consumer confidence in a dangerous and incredibly fragile industry. Don't forget that if SpaceShipTwo blows up on one of its commercial flights, that could be the end of not just Virgin, but the entire space tourism industry. Regulations aren't always bad, and the political upside is in PR, not liability protection.
Problems still arise with bias, but generally they arise in some of the less travelled articles where individuals can cut what they don't like. For example, the article on the Laurentian Leadership Centre, where I happen to be right now, was expanded upon by one of the students. Another editor simply didn't like the host school and cut it back considerably (although it looks like the proper edits are back), censoring what he didn't like and creating a bias. It's like the plagiarism thing a while back - quality decreases when traffic decreases, but that's the nature of a Wiki project, I suppose.
Try asking those same foreigners about another country - China, say, if you're in France, or Germany if you're in Japan. Odds are, they won't know much about the history of those countries because knowing about them doesn't play into one's everyday life to nearly the same degree. Our elections get global coverage, while Italian elections get maybe a story or two. Better yet, ask Canadians about their history. They know more about Canada than the average American, but a goodly chunk never even know about their first prime minister (Sir John A. MacDonald, if you're wondering). People learn about America because it's useful, not because they're better cultured.
Bloody... meant 8.
Should be 7 in the first line: There once was a lady named Bright...
Yeah.... no. California has a partially direct democracy and it makes the state nearly ungovernable. The Teacher's Union can say "Think of the children!" when demanding a guarunteed wage hike be written into the state Constitution. Then it is. Only 30% of the income from taxpayers is actually available to the State Legislature to move about, making the solving of budget deficits nigh impossible. It is... well, bad. On top of that, I'm a political science student and even I find voting a chore. I have something like 15 bills to research and vote on for this next election, some of which are incredibly stupid (put GPS trackers on sex offenders for the rest of their lives), some of which aren't but incur about $37 billion in debt when the state's credit rating already sucks.
What if I were just an average Joe that didn't have the time or inclination to read through my Voter's Guide and check the internet for news articles? What if all I got for information were the crappy little issue ads put out by the special interest groups? California is run by the populist unions and special interest groups that write their platforms into the Constitution through direct democracy initiatives.
No, I dislike Direct Democracy, however much I like the concept.
Ah peas, that's nothing! 160kbps? I laugh. Gimme the 320kbps version, then we can talk.
Wow, just like fusion!
I'm surprised that you've been as far afield as Malawi's more medieval areas and not realized that not all poor regions are like that. In the Sahel, cell phones are sometimes used to help coordinate the cattle migrations. In the cities, people do their banking and their bartering, they check the weather, check the prices of food, all on cell phones. Proper computers would probably go even further in helping people lift themselves out of poverty. I'm sure that if you gave the villagers in the place you visited a radio even, they'd learn a great deal to help them out. Give them a computer and the means to get it powered and online and they'd catch on, with training. I think you're underestimating the people and the technology while overestimating the depth of their isolation.
It is just you, to clarify.
My region already has open-source religion anyway: gotta love New Agers and their crystals.
It's British legalese - anti-social behavior is code for bratty and/or obnoxious kids. It disturbed me too, although more that the enforcement of the law had drifted so far from the spirit of the law than anything else. Enforcement against anti-social behavior is highly subjective, after all, and thus requies a police department to train officers to recognize the difference between a bratty kid and a belligerent neighbor.
Japan has pleanty of giant, radioactive monsters; how could one more hurt?
I suppose it wouldn't help to tell you that the income gap in European nanny states is lower (quite lower) than it is in the US. Giving cash to the poor probably isn't what does it, though - it's probably the investment in infrastructure to help the poor, things like national healthcare, free or cheap university, job centres, housing, and so on.
Odds are though, if we cut out NASA's budget, it would probably get rolled into the Pentagon's budget. Pitty, that.
Mmmmm..... badly rehashed Foucault....
Well, Maxis has always been about the "software toys," games with no clear end and with mainly user-set goals. I've often wanted to see the various games stitched together, like SimLife, SimEarth and SimCity. I think people still play the Sims because it really is more of a toy than a game (with most of the interactions being common-sense, i.e., don't make out with someone in front of your spouse). The question remains, though, if Spore will appeal to that same sort of common-sense, or if it will require too much thought for the average human.
Way to jump to a conclusion there. Companies already have record retention legislation governing them, so that 'Big Brother' knows who imported what when, who ordered what, and so on. In fact, companies even keep your credit card numbers on file! Although that's not government accessible, the other stuff is. If you've ordered something in the last five years from a company, you bet your ass it's on record. I just spent my past week filing all that stuff away. It's not a breach of privacy, it's company records that I'm honestly surprised Myspace doesn't have. And besides, if you're looking for predators, you can't just look where the prey has been.
And Ohio! Don't forget Ohio!
1. Not at all remotely connected to the topic
2. Stop plagiarising
3. Personal experience and a heartwarming tale do not make science or ethical norms, although they do make the reddest of herrings
The problem stems not from capitalism but how loud various groups are. The two things that amplify a group's concerns are membership and money. Since groups lobbying for tight IP laws generally have a great deal more money than lobbyist groups advocating liberal IP laws have members, they have a louder voice and so get their arguments across more fully to government officials.
/. PAC would help to turn the tide because, y'know, we love to bitch about it so much.
Perhaps a