You know, I hate to break the "we share a secret, and we are better than the majority of slashdot" mood here, but you do know that I'm not trolling, right? These are (mostly) my opinions, although I have been known to play devil's advocate, and even outright troll opinions I do not hold, simply for the sake of diversifying the slashdot groupthink.
I feel like that if I don't respond, then someone is going to link to this discussion as "proof" that I am a troll. God knows, it's been tried before. I even had one guy metaphorically "give me a cookie" for successfully having people reply to my "trolling" while having my nickname for everyone to see.
But then again, you probably read that, didn't you?;)
Hey, we should call it an imaginary police state. Because it works with intangible data, not our physically-manifested freedoms. Therefore, it cannot be analogous to real police states.
I clicked on the link, expecting some half-baked vilification of modern society, but aside from the inane introduction, the ranking system appears clear, logical, fair, and relevant.
We shouldn't judge them for releasing a bloat of an operating system with so much DRM embedded that MS & the media companies almost have more control of your hardware than you do.
But they didn't, and they won't for at least another 11 months. And even then, they don't have control over your PC. You have to install it first, and then you need to remove any notion of installing anything else.
Microsoft is in business to make as much money as possible. They do this by breaking the law and abusing the monopolistic hold they have on the OS market. It most certainly IS some nefarious move by Microsoft orchestrated to increase their profits. To think otherwise is naive.
Since mking money is neither nefarious or illegal, how about you point out exactly what is illegal about releasing a release candidate for public testing? It might have been a monopoly issue if switching back to a different OS was difficult, but, as you said so yourself, they recommend that you reinstall their own OS, making the barrier for entry similar for not switching similar to switching.
I agree with the sibling poster (who was modded troll). This is just FUD.
Except, of course, to say that it was a joke. Notice that I made reference to thinking while... er, never mind. I'm sure with all your experience with sarcasm, you might have met sarcasm's plainer cousin irony once or twice. God knows I've used both a lot in all the time you've been stalking me. Also, I have been known to make cheap and sometimes ineffectual shots at certain opinions, even when spoken in jest.
Sorry, but I find this very weird. I have never once had a freak give me a smiley face (again, even in jest).
Would that really simplify the law? Instead of having to learn the ins and outs of many years of cumulative documentation, we would have to be adept at reading 12 stranger's minds. We would never know if we were operating in or outside the law.
And, not that I don't condone free thought, but has anyone here actually considered that a lot of very intelligent people have already pondered this problem, both throughout history and the present day? What we have is largely the result of many years of careful consideration and thought, and any radical changes you have proposed have not been successfully implemented in any legal system so far. What are the chances, seriously, that they were all wrong, and you are right?
I'm pretty sure the guy was referring to a sweet spot.
On one hand, it is absolutely vital that the everyday person knows enough of the law to ensure he is confident that he won't be caught doing anything illegal. On the other hand, it is also vital that the law actually do its job, and do its job with a minimum of false positives. Overly complex laws fail the former, and simple laws fail the latter. As the parent was saying, simplifying laws to the extent of eliminating lawyers would be harmful to our social order.
you guys are not very smart, are you? you can't quite see that you created this monster and are still arguing that the monster 'needs' to continue living.
so that the monster can continue.
circular, huh?
Wow, you're an idiot.
lawyers are slime and the fact that you 'need' them indicates a bigger social problem.
Social problems such as individualism, crime, or free thought for example? Because any of those can sink "simple" laws.
I respect your point, but you need to give credit where credit is due. Laws that people refuse to obey should be reconsidered. However, the mere fact that people refuse to obey them is not nearly enough to sink the law unilaterally. We have to show that it's not just a case of people saying "But I don't wanna obey the law!"; it's truly a law we don't need. The problem with copyright specifically is that people disobeying the law is evidence that we need what the law protects, so by getting rid of it, we run the very serious risk that the people driving us to get rid of the law, will actually be unhappier once it's gone.
So, Apple is applying for a patent for this "invention"? They would deny everyone else the right to make a system that forces people to buy from them in order to activate a basic feature?
Perhaps software patents can be used for the power of good after all...
Why is that the people who stand-by the founding principles of the United States (individual rights, small limited government), are the ones who are always asked to leave???
Why do people think that just because they hold an extreme libertarian view, they represent the founding fathers of the US? They were smart enough to realise that a government couldn't run on pure fear of authority, so they figured taxes wasn't a bad idea. I believe they referred to no taxation without representation, so populaces could be taxed as much as they wanted, so long as they're views are represented democratically, and there's a fair chance for taking down unfair taxes. Now, your problem is that people like having this social insurance policy, even if it means a drain on the pocketbook. You are represented, you just aren't over-represented enough to overrule everyone who isn't a crackpot.
Besides, you weren't asked to leave, you were asked to pay your fair share, or should you choose not to pay your fair share, quit wasting US space. The primary goal here is to get you to pay your fair share.
YOU are the ones who are not, with your desire to ignore the constitution completely, drive our national debt ~$170,000 per home during the next four years, grow the government into an over-arching monolith that regulates every facet of our lives, and via the internet monitor our activities (see Speaker of House Polosi's new law, circa Feb 15, 2009).
I'm going to dismiss that as a false dichotomy until evidence arrives to back it up. All I'm saying is that taxes are necessary, which they really, truly are, unless you are comfortable with exactly zero government or law (there are only a handful of people so out of touch to believe something like that would be good). Nothing about that implies I want to ignore the constitution completely, or drive up national debt, or continue to boost government size (beyond something than a bare, bare minimum), or instigate internet monitoring.
It is people like me who spout reason, and it is people like you who spout false dichotomies.
If anybody should leave, it should be you.
I was never here. I live in a different country, but most of this stuff applies to me, because I live in a similarly free democracy, and, you guessed it, my people have also recognised that taxes are necessary. Most people in most countries have already.
With the exception of the first and last paragraph, every single sentence you uttered was wrong. Every rhetorical question you asked was either moot, or inflected completely the wrong way. Every single one. You have completely misjudged, and I can only hope for the sake of the human race, misread my comment, and lit up a strawman in celebration of your display of massive, massive idiocy. Historical evidence and logic have long abandoned people who are as abrasively stupid as you, sir.
Enjoy alienating people from your cause. For that, at least, I can thank you.
You say illusion, I say difference in definition. Chalk that up to a) "Property simply doesn't work that way".
You see, as an atheist (for all intents and purposes), I don't believe there is a single definition of property that's handed down from God almighty, that's carved in stone, and can never be changed. I believe that man created property, and we can sure as hell change it, extend it, or dispense with it if ever necessary. So we are allowed to define property in such a way that:
a) The property of two people (who may never have met) can overlap and b) people can own pieces of information when regarded in context
And besides, as I think I mentioned so long ago, physical property is an illusion that completely unfounded in the space-time continuum, and is simply a construct created by man (in spite of said continuum). It is no less of an illusion than what I propose.
Sure, except.... you cannot control the distribution either! In order to do so you would have to a) prevent people from coming up with "your property" completely independently
Ah, but this is a non-issue. If you come up with information independently, then the information is "yours" as well. If my credit card is short on digits enough that you can feasibly guess my credit card number, then it isn't long enough to be considered exclusively my property. If my bank gave me a 1-digit number, for example, that digit would not be protected if someone tried that number while buying online, because it's so trivially easy. If you look at my number, remember it, and claim you came up with it independently, then you have "stolen" information and you are a "thief".
Remember also that, if by some method you come across someone else's credit card number (and you know it's a credit card number), it's a little like becoming the accidental recipient of stolen property. If you decide to make some purchases, or find out the person's name, address, and confidential medical records, then you are an information "thief". If you decide to alert the credit card company, or just forget about it, then you are not in the wrong.
and b) ensure that a scientific method exists to determine that it is in fact the "copy" in question, which after applying even the simplest of transforms (such as noise) is no longer feasible.
Sure. Here's a method:
a) Display the information obtained that is allegedly "stolen" b) Display the original (or identical) copy of information c) Ask a judge, or a panel of people, like a jury, whether they think the information was copied or not
It's scientific enough for most court issues.
The "intellectual property" is unfeasible not because we "had different values" (a specious point since my values for example had not changed) but because physical property could be taken from the "common pool". "Intellectual property" cannot. It and its component parts are abstract entities which cannot be "taken" or "controlled" in any way. And that is one of the reasons why the concept of "intellectual property" it is a scam.
... accompanied by the obligatory big gaping hole in the argument. It is possible for multiple people to "own" the same intellectual property! The fact that a piece of information is in the common pool is no obstacle to the concept of someone owning it in tandem with the rest of the public, but the example is vacuous, because such property would be worthless (and hence completely unrecognised by law). Worthwhile pieces of intellectual property are pieces of information not yet thought of, and unlikely to ever be thought of without directly copying. That way, thanks to time restrictions on IP, the common pool grows increasingly large.
These are simply silly contortions designed to hide the fundamental flaw of the concept.
Say, for example, you have a child (say 13 or 14), and some peeping tom caught him or her experimenting sexually in bed. They then this guy decides to share this video with other like-minded creeps, which is sharing child pornography, and is, quite frankly, wrong (being a humiliating, drastic, and irreversible infringement on a child's right to privacy). Now, the paedophile has the option to move offshore, to a country with lower ages of consent, both for sex and participating in pornography (don't ask me to name a specific country though, let's just suppose one exists). They can continue to distribute the video, and it will be legal in the (possibly fictional) country, so no-one will be able to stop him depriving your son or daughter of their right to privacy, and he'll keep doing it. That's pretty fucking wrong, if you ask me.
Now that's an extreme example, but I'm sure we can come up with others, where the outlier laws in a single, or handful of countries scuttle the laws of everyone else. The internet is an international communication medium, and I think it would be a fine idea to start treating it as such.
Yeah! Fkin thieves! My landlord tried the same thing! He had the balls to come up to my door, in my apartment, and demand that I pay him (get this) "rent", which is newspeak for legally-sanctioned thievery! He then evicted me, which is completely 100% the same as someone stealing my own house at gun-point.
Uh, and, since I don't have anywhere to live, my car has been "repossessed", and my bank accounts have been "frozen", I kinda wish there was some way that I could get some support, y'know? I tried begging at my favourite businesses, but they didn't like me as much as they did, for some reason. If only there was a way to get a little bit of money, so I could start earning, and being an asshole again...
a) Slave: You have no choice but to stay and work for no money in order to pay for Billy's wants and needs. b) Citizen: You have the choice of leaving, or staying and paying your fair share to help Billy's, and many other people's needs (as a kind of insurance policy in case disaster ever happens to befall you), all the while retaining a healthy income.
Of course, selecting your country based on which requires taxes, or which has public health care, won't leave you with too many desirable options, given that they are a hallmark of a healthy and mature society.
For me the only option when it comes to watching shows is getting them online (and I am sad to say the options for doing that legal is severely limited in my Country); so for the most part I just have to do without until reality catches up with technology and gives me options suited to my lifestyle.
Kudos to you! It's encouraging to see someone who likes watching television programs, doesn't like television, feels things should change, and is actually doing something constructive about it. Too many people pirate these days facing similar situations, and all it does is give television companies leverage. They know you want what they've got, and, by pirating, all you do is gather them sympathy. So, again, kudos to you for demonstrating just how much change really means to you!
Slashdot Mirror
Sold!
Thousands of years of tradition, common sense, law, observation of human responses to financial incentives, to name a few. What does?
You know, I hate to break the "we share a secret, and we are better than the majority of slashdot" mood here, but you do know that I'm not trolling, right? These are (mostly) my opinions, although I have been known to play devil's advocate, and even outright troll opinions I do not hold, simply for the sake of diversifying the slashdot groupthink.
I feel like that if I don't respond, then someone is going to link to this discussion as "proof" that I am a troll. God knows, it's been tried before. I even had one guy metaphorically "give me a cookie" for successfully having people reply to my "trolling" while having my nickname for everyone to see.
But then again, you probably read that, didn't you? ;)
Hey, we should call it an imaginary police state. Because it works with intangible data, not our physically-manifested freedoms. Therefore, it cannot be analogous to real police states.
I clicked on the link, expecting some half-baked vilification of modern society, but aside from the inane introduction, the ranking system appears clear, logical, fair, and relevant.
But they didn't, and they won't for at least another 11 months. And even then, they don't have control over your PC. You have to install it first, and then you need to remove any notion of installing anything else.
Since mking money is neither nefarious or illegal, how about you point out exactly what is illegal about releasing a release candidate for public testing? It might have been a monopoly issue if switching back to a different OS was difficult, but, as you said so yourself, they recommend that you reinstall their own OS, making the barrier for entry similar for not switching similar to switching.
I agree with the sibling poster (who was modded troll). This is just FUD.
I... I simply do not know how to respond to this.
Except, of course, to say that it was a joke. Notice that I made reference to thinking while... er, never mind. I'm sure with all your experience with sarcasm, you might have met sarcasm's plainer cousin irony once or twice. God knows I've used both a lot in all the time you've been stalking me. Also, I have been known to make cheap and sometimes ineffectual shots at certain opinions, even when spoken in jest.
Sorry, but I find this very weird. I have never once had a freak give me a smiley face (again, even in jest).
Wait. Think about what you just said...
Would that really simplify the law? Instead of having to learn the ins and outs of many years of cumulative documentation, we would have to be adept at reading 12 stranger's minds. We would never know if we were operating in or outside the law.
And, not that I don't condone free thought, but has anyone here actually considered that a lot of very intelligent people have already pondered this problem, both throughout history and the present day? What we have is largely the result of many years of careful consideration and thought, and any radical changes you have proposed have not been successfully implemented in any legal system so far. What are the chances, seriously, that they were all wrong, and you are right?
I'm pretty sure the guy was referring to a sweet spot.
On one hand, it is absolutely vital that the everyday person knows enough of the law to ensure he is confident that he won't be caught doing anything illegal. On the other hand, it is also vital that the law actually do its job, and do its job with a minimum of false positives. Overly complex laws fail the former, and simple laws fail the latter. As the parent was saying, simplifying laws to the extent of eliminating lawyers would be harmful to our social order.
Wow, you're an idiot.
Social problems such as individualism, crime, or free thought for example? Because any of those can sink "simple" laws.
I respect your point, but you need to give credit where credit is due. Laws that people refuse to obey should be reconsidered. However, the mere fact that people refuse to obey them is not nearly enough to sink the law unilaterally. We have to show that it's not just a case of people saying "But I don't wanna obey the law!"; it's truly a law we don't need. The problem with copyright specifically is that people disobeying the law is evidence that we need what the law protects, so by getting rid of it, we run the very serious risk that the people driving us to get rid of the law, will actually be unhappier once it's gone.
You say that now...
Some are born original, some achieve originality, and some have originality thrust upon 'em.
-- Steve Jobs, presumably.
So, Apple is applying for a patent for this "invention"? They would deny everyone else the right to make a system that forces people to buy from them in order to activate a basic feature?
Perhaps software patents can be used for the power of good after all...
That's true. I hear they don't even read the bills put in front of them these days.
I do, however, think we can put a little more trust in the courts. It's ultimately their decisions that decide whether such a law is unenforceable.
Why do people think that just because they hold an extreme libertarian view, they represent the founding fathers of the US? They were smart enough to realise that a government couldn't run on pure fear of authority, so they figured taxes wasn't a bad idea. I believe they referred to no taxation without representation, so populaces could be taxed as much as they wanted, so long as they're views are represented democratically, and there's a fair chance for taking down unfair taxes. Now, your problem is that people like having this social insurance policy, even if it means a drain on the pocketbook. You are represented, you just aren't over-represented enough to overrule everyone who isn't a crackpot.
Besides, you weren't asked to leave, you were asked to pay your fair share, or should you choose not to pay your fair share, quit wasting US space. The primary goal here is to get you to pay your fair share.
I'm going to dismiss that as a false dichotomy until evidence arrives to back it up. All I'm saying is that taxes are necessary, which they really, truly are, unless you are comfortable with exactly zero government or law (there are only a handful of people so out of touch to believe something like that would be good). Nothing about that implies I want to ignore the constitution completely, or drive up national debt, or continue to boost government size (beyond something than a bare, bare minimum), or instigate internet monitoring.
It is people like me who spout reason, and it is people like you who spout false dichotomies.
I was never here. I live in a different country, but most of this stuff applies to me, because I live in a similarly free democracy, and, you guessed it, my people have also recognised that taxes are necessary. Most people in most countries have already.
With the exception of the first and last paragraph, every single sentence you uttered was wrong. Every rhetorical question you asked was either moot, or inflected completely the wrong way. Every single one. You have completely misjudged, and I can only hope for the sake of the human race, misread my comment, and lit up a strawman in celebration of your display of massive, massive idiocy. Historical evidence and logic have long abandoned people who are as abrasively stupid as you, sir.
Enjoy alienating people from your cause. For that, at least, I can thank you.
It's OK. From my experience, about this point, the posts start shrinking dramatically. But ye asked, and ye shall receive.
You say illusion, I say difference in definition. Chalk that up to a) "Property simply doesn't work that way".
You see, as an atheist (for all intents and purposes), I don't believe there is a single definition of property that's handed down from God almighty, that's carved in stone, and can never be changed. I believe that man created property, and we can sure as hell change it, extend it, or dispense with it if ever necessary. So we are allowed to define property in such a way that:
a) The property of two people (who may never have met) can overlap and
b) people can own pieces of information when regarded in context
And besides, as I think I mentioned so long ago, physical property is an illusion that completely unfounded in the space-time continuum, and is simply a construct created by man (in spite of said continuum). It is no less of an illusion than what I propose.
Ah, but this is a non-issue. If you come up with information independently, then the information is "yours" as well. If my credit card is short on digits enough that you can feasibly guess my credit card number, then it isn't long enough to be considered exclusively my property. If my bank gave me a 1-digit number, for example, that digit would not be protected if someone tried that number while buying online, because it's so trivially easy. If you look at my number, remember it, and claim you came up with it independently, then you have "stolen" information and you are a "thief".
Remember also that, if by some method you come across someone else's credit card number (and you know it's a credit card number), it's a little like becoming the accidental recipient of stolen property. If you decide to make some purchases, or find out the person's name, address, and confidential medical records, then you are an information "thief". If you decide to alert the credit card company, or just forget about it, then you are not in the wrong.
Sure. Here's a method:
a) Display the information obtained that is allegedly "stolen"
b) Display the original (or identical) copy of information
c) Ask a judge, or a panel of people, like a jury, whether they think the information was copied or not
It's scientific enough for most court issues.
... accompanied by the obligatory big gaping hole in the argument. It is possible for multiple people to "own" the same intellectual property! The fact that a piece of information is in the common pool is no obstacle to the concept of someone owning it in tandem with the rest of the public, but the example is vacuous, because such property would be worthless (and hence completely unrecognised by law). Worthwhile pieces of intellectual property are pieces of information not yet thought of, and unlikely to ever be thought of without directly copying. That way, thanks to time restrictions on IP, the common pool grows increasingly large.
OK, so n
Not that, specifically.
Say, for example, you have a child (say 13 or 14), and some peeping tom caught him or her experimenting sexually in bed. They then this guy decides to share this video with other like-minded creeps, which is sharing child pornography, and is, quite frankly, wrong (being a humiliating, drastic, and irreversible infringement on a child's right to privacy). Now, the paedophile has the option to move offshore, to a country with lower ages of consent, both for sex and participating in pornography (don't ask me to name a specific country though, let's just suppose one exists). They can continue to distribute the video, and it will be legal in the (possibly fictional) country, so no-one will be able to stop him depriving your son or daughter of their right to privacy, and he'll keep doing it. That's pretty fucking wrong, if you ask me.
Now that's an extreme example, but I'm sure we can come up with others, where the outlier laws in a single, or handful of countries scuttle the laws of everyone else. The internet is an international communication medium, and I think it would be a fine idea to start treating it as such.
Yeah! Fkin thieves! My landlord tried the same thing! He had the balls to come up to my door, in my apartment, and demand that I pay him (get this) "rent", which is newspeak for legally-sanctioned thievery! He then evicted me, which is completely 100% the same as someone stealing my own house at gun-point.
Uh, and, since I don't have anywhere to live, my car has been "repossessed", and my bank accounts have been "frozen", I kinda wish there was some way that I could get some support, y'know? I tried begging at my favourite businesses, but they didn't like me as much as they did, for some reason. If only there was a way to get a little bit of money, so I could start earning, and being an asshole again...
Oh well, a man can dream.
Allow me to demonstrate the difference here:
a) Slave: You have no choice but to stay and work for no money in order to pay for Billy's wants and needs.
b) Citizen: You have the choice of leaving, or staying and paying your fair share to help Billy's, and many other people's needs (as a kind of insurance policy in case disaster ever happens to befall you), all the while retaining a healthy income.
Of course, selecting your country based on which requires taxes, or which has public health care, won't leave you with too many desirable options, given that they are a hallmark of a healthy and mature society.
Kudos to you! It's encouraging to see someone who likes watching television programs, doesn't like television, feels things should change, and is actually doing something constructive about it. Too many people pirate these days facing similar situations, and all it does is give television companies leverage. They know you want what they've got, and, by pirating, all you do is gather them sympathy. So, again, kudos to you for demonstrating just how much change really means to you!
I think it was funnier before I noticed the misspelling.