Also, "corporate socialism" is literally impossible. The word you are looking for is corporatism. However, that is not what is going on here by a longshot. Corporatism is when large companies collude to influence the government into aiding them; ie, RIAA/MPAA. I don't see how that is being invoked in this case.
Don't be misled so easily. It is true that now corporations are profiting where they did not before, but the government almost certainly increased its cut in the process. Here in NC, the liquor control board has been bleeding money for years; far from reducing taxes.
I'd really rather not have the state shove morality down my throat by taxing some items more than others so that the richest can get off without paying their taxes (which is basically the whole point of no income tax states; "make" your money there, take it elsewhere). But to claim the prices increased because of the deregulation, when it is clearly the added tax on top of sales tax? What kind of cognitive dissonance is that?
I'm also not sure how you can claim selection got worse. With controlled alcohol, you have one store; if they don't stock it, tough (because the state is likely also making unconstitutional claims you cannot have it shipped from out of state). Sure Walmart might not stock as wide a selection, but someone CAN have wider, including specialty stores, which is not the case with one store.
Well, they can always claim they are good at defense, since we haven't been invaded in a long time. If you put war back in the name, people might start asking questions about why a department with "war" in the name utterly failed the last several we were in.
Hackers are like soldiers, though, in that defense and offense are really not that far apart (with the exception of just following good programming standards). Just like you can order the guy keeping watch to go shoot at some people, a 'friendly' hacker can still hack your enemies, in theory.
The overall problem with "cyber war" is that it seems like the new excuse, now that kiddie porn has kind of fizzled out and piracy is widely accepted, to lock down the internet. The only real answer is to stop having vital systems programmed by idiots connected to the internet. When most bank and government systems are less secure than a site running PHPBB (for example, using unencrypted passwords), there is a serious problem that can't be fixed by plastering it over with censorship and playing war.
It all depends on how you measure "smart." You can do it the D&D way (loved by the education system) of knowing many facts, you can base it on how able the person is to figure out problems they encounter, or you can define it as their ratio of correctness/incorrectness. Take any mix you like, the answer is probably all in combination. The option not present is, of course and importantly, consensus of others. Everyone who was ever right about something others had not considered had to start by being "wrong" by consensus.
I do just that. Usually they either locate one of the few words I chronically misuse (partially the fault of the spell checker) or occasionally a broken sentence from my last edit-through. The second case I would usually catch on my own after another editing run.
The issue I am getting at is results, not consensuses, matter. It doesn't matter if I look insane to people if I get the results I want. It might be easy for things I do to be called "mistakes" by others when I in fact have good reason to do commit them. Yes, it is important to be objective. That's kind of the whole point. There are ways to that and all of those ways are ultimately introspective: what do I have to gain from this, have I considered the alternatives, what is the probability of it working/me being right, etc.? Worrying about how the uninformed will perceive your activities is NOT objectivity in any way. It is in fact worse than self-delusion. However, I guess I can see how that might help people who are so irrational they are below the average. It's the difference between an atheist trying to see the point of Jesus and a death cult member trying to see the point of Jesus: one is lowering themselves, the other might actually gain something.
"You are welcome to go "pirate" the Diablo 3 DVD as much as you want, since it's useless without a battle.net account and activation code."
Yes, it is basically a MMO, not an actual standalone game. I wouldn't be too sure that it will never happen, though. Whole slews of MMOs have been reverse engineered. It never really caught on (except Ragnarok, which seemed more popular for knockoff servers than the actual game), but it happens.
Why would you take out your anger on software stores by stealing the property they already paid the publisher for? It only means they have to buy another copy.
Unless you meant piracy, which is not stealing, and you should use proper, non-weasel-worded terminology to describe it.
All the lofty ideas of reinforcing fair use in the world are worthless for two reasons:
1. As long as a media industry exists, any progress will be rolled back;
2. Nothing exists in a vacuum. If I want to write a book in the Avatar setting and sell it, that is morally right by my standards, yet is still illegal under yours. Since everything is, at some point, based on another thing, it is only a matter of time until that system comes crashing down in apparent ways as well.
Total abolition is the only answer that fixes the problem permanently.
Stupid people are likely to point out errors where none exist, though. I'll take my own reasoning, which has proven to be the best of anyone I know, regardless of what TFA says.
The opposite is definitely not true. Very few people can be convinced they are wrong, even when blatantly shown to be. Combine this with the fact that people often surround themselves with people who hold similar major biases (churchs, political groups, etc) and you have a situation where external factors actually reinforce false ideas. I tend to view biases as being only in the ability of the person holding them to change - introspection is the ONLY way to become more objective.
Copyright is incompatible with modern, global civilization and efforts to change this will simply result in corporatism which will eventually collapse. In the mean time, those countries that adopt protectionist, innovation-strangling patent and copyright laws will be trampled by countries like China and India.
It's time to let the Romantic myth of divine inspiration die and respect freedom of communication. We all build on what came before - copyright hinders us all and the methods being proposed to prop it up go beyond hindrance into oppression.
There are a lot of intelligent people on slashdot. The problem is that on some topics, the dumb ones are REALLY loud.
To say that there isn't racism involved in politics now is absurd. All the birther BS would never have happened if Obama was white: this we all know. It is entirely a smear campaign based on the feeling among many that somehow, Obama can't be an "American." Add to that all the usual idiots (Obama is a socialist, Obama wants to make us like France/Germany/Italy, Obama is a Muslim...) getting absurdly louder, and it's pretty hard to think race has nothing to do with this.
Is Obama great? No, by no means. Were the last few? Hell no. Given the actual powers of the president (and I get the feeling a lot of people think the president has the power to do ANYTHING), he isn't half bad. Keep in mind, he has to deal with idiot rage every time he does anything actually progressive, so it is hard to fault him on that count. I more blame the idiocracy and bigotry, especially among congress members (and I think we know what side that tends to fall on more heavily) than Obama for most of the bad things going on now.
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You mean Roman Catholicism?
Also, "corporate socialism" is literally impossible. The word you are looking for is corporatism. However, that is not what is going on here by a longshot. Corporatism is when large companies collude to influence the government into aiding them; ie, RIAA/MPAA. I don't see how that is being invoked in this case.
Don't be misled so easily. It is true that now corporations are profiting where they did not before, but the government almost certainly increased its cut in the process. Here in NC, the liquor control board has been bleeding money for years; far from reducing taxes.
I'd really rather not have the state shove morality down my throat by taxing some items more than others so that the richest can get off without paying their taxes (which is basically the whole point of no income tax states; "make" your money there, take it elsewhere). But to claim the prices increased because of the deregulation, when it is clearly the added tax on top of sales tax? What kind of cognitive dissonance is that?
I'm also not sure how you can claim selection got worse. With controlled alcohol, you have one store; if they don't stock it, tough (because the state is likely also making unconstitutional claims you cannot have it shipped from out of state). Sure Walmart might not stock as wide a selection, but someone CAN have wider, including specialty stores, which is not the case with one store.
Well, they can always claim they are good at defense, since we haven't been invaded in a long time. If you put war back in the name, people might start asking questions about why a department with "war" in the name utterly failed the last several we were in.
Hackers are like soldiers, though, in that defense and offense are really not that far apart (with the exception of just following good programming standards). Just like you can order the guy keeping watch to go shoot at some people, a 'friendly' hacker can still hack your enemies, in theory.
The overall problem with "cyber war" is that it seems like the new excuse, now that kiddie porn has kind of fizzled out and piracy is widely accepted, to lock down the internet. The only real answer is to stop having vital systems programmed by idiots connected to the internet. When most bank and government systems are less secure than a site running PHPBB (for example, using unencrypted passwords), there is a serious problem that can't be fixed by plastering it over with censorship and playing war.
It all depends on how you measure "smart." You can do it the D&D way (loved by the education system) of knowing many facts, you can base it on how able the person is to figure out problems they encounter, or you can define it as their ratio of correctness/incorrectness. Take any mix you like, the answer is probably all in combination. The option not present is, of course and importantly, consensus of others. Everyone who was ever right about something others had not considered had to start by being "wrong" by consensus.
I do just that. Usually they either locate one of the few words I chronically misuse (partially the fault of the spell checker) or occasionally a broken sentence from my last edit-through. The second case I would usually catch on my own after another editing run.
The issue I am getting at is results, not consensuses, matter. It doesn't matter if I look insane to people if I get the results I want. It might be easy for things I do to be called "mistakes" by others when I in fact have good reason to do commit them. Yes, it is important to be objective. That's kind of the whole point. There are ways to that and all of those ways are ultimately introspective: what do I have to gain from this, have I considered the alternatives, what is the probability of it working/me being right, etc.? Worrying about how the uninformed will perceive your activities is NOT objectivity in any way. It is in fact worse than self-delusion. However, I guess I can see how that might help people who are so irrational they are below the average. It's the difference between an atheist trying to see the point of Jesus and a death cult member trying to see the point of Jesus: one is lowering themselves, the other might actually gain something.
Perhaps I should replace my so-called copyright screed with a disclaimer that if I say something stupid, it is probably facetious.
That's ok, I like to think of myself as more of a Noldor Elf.
Looks like I needed to use the sarcasm HTML tag. I thought I was extravagant enough not to need it...
Don't forget, stem cells are a horrible abomination because they sometimes involve killing things which could potentially become a human some day!
"You are welcome to go "pirate" the Diablo 3 DVD as much as you want, since it's useless without a battle.net account and activation code."
Yes, it is basically a MMO, not an actual standalone game. I wouldn't be too sure that it will never happen, though. Whole slews of MMOs have been reverse engineered. It never really caught on (except Ragnarok, which seemed more popular for knockoff servers than the actual game), but it happens.
Or, they'll just get half American, half British accents and start selling jam and olive oil while living with an incompetent government. The horror!
"I'd probably start stealing their games."
Why would you take out your anger on software stores by stealing the property they already paid the publisher for? It only means they have to buy another copy.
Unless you meant piracy, which is not stealing, and you should use proper, non-weasel-worded terminology to describe it.
I have a Cambodian Ph.D! No, no, not a Ph.D in Cambodian...
All the lofty ideas of reinforcing fair use in the world are worthless for two reasons:
1. As long as a media industry exists, any progress will be rolled back;
2. Nothing exists in a vacuum. If I want to write a book in the Avatar setting and sell it, that is morally right by my standards, yet is still illegal under yours. Since everything is, at some point, based on another thing, it is only a matter of time until that system comes crashing down in apparent ways as well.
Total abolition is the only answer that fixes the problem permanently.
I'm still looking for a Warp Physicist. I tell you, if we had more H1Bs, this wouldn't be a problem!
...for a good cause.
Seriously, why is the only reason good things ever happen online laziness? It doesn't reflect well on those in power.
Stupid people are likely to point out errors where none exist, though. I'll take my own reasoning, which has proven to be the best of anyone I know, regardless of what TFA says.
The opposite is definitely not true. Very few people can be convinced they are wrong, even when blatantly shown to be. Combine this with the fact that people often surround themselves with people who hold similar major biases (churchs, political groups, etc) and you have a situation where external factors actually reinforce false ideas. I tend to view biases as being only in the ability of the person holding them to change - introspection is the ONLY way to become more objective.
"Get the facts!" is the motto of corporate FUD. It's something everyone with a brain knows. Don't let the RIAA types know!
Copyright is incompatible with modern, global civilization and efforts to change this will simply result in corporatism which will eventually collapse. In the mean time, those countries that adopt protectionist, innovation-strangling patent and copyright laws will be trampled by countries like China and India.
It's time to let the Romantic myth of divine inspiration die and respect freedom of communication. We all build on what came before - copyright hinders us all and the methods being proposed to prop it up go beyond hindrance into oppression.
In honestly? Torrenting is probably a lot faster. Any time games have patches, etc... the torrent is always about 5 times faster.
There are a lot of intelligent people on slashdot. The problem is that on some topics, the dumb ones are REALLY loud.
To say that there isn't racism involved in politics now is absurd. All the birther BS would never have happened if Obama was white: this we all know. It is entirely a smear campaign based on the feeling among many that somehow, Obama can't be an "American." Add to that all the usual idiots (Obama is a socialist, Obama wants to make us like France/Germany/Italy, Obama is a Muslim...) getting absurdly louder, and it's pretty hard to think race has nothing to do with this.
Is Obama great? No, by no means. Were the last few? Hell no. Given the actual powers of the president (and I get the feeling a lot of people think the president has the power to do ANYTHING), he isn't half bad. Keep in mind, he has to deal with idiot rage every time he does anything actually progressive, so it is hard to fault him on that count. I more blame the idiocracy and bigotry, especially among congress members (and I think we know what side that tends to fall on more heavily) than Obama for most of the bad things going on now.
When the people rule, they enforce tyranny. Since the majority wins, that tyranny is of the majority. Glad I could educate you.