Every game on the OUYA can be tried for free. You don't have to put a credit card in to start downloading apps from the store.

Actually, it seems about half of the Kickstarter backers (myself included) are being forced to enter their credit card info just to get to the console's main menu.

My OUYA is sitting on my shelf, unused at the moment, because I refuse to put my credit card into it as I wait for a response from OUYA support. I have no idea why some people are getting in for free, and others of us are being forced to enter credit card info, but there had sure be a good explanation.

np. Thanks.

+1 Thankyou for a clear and detailed description of Minecraft authentication. Makes sense that it's not DRM.

I haven't tried Minecraft myself (I was turned off by the DRM). But I've read a lot of online discussions where someone claims there is online activation and they can't play while the server is down, and other people quickly come on to say it's not that bad. But it seems like there is DRM and while you can play single player offline, you cannot connect to servers even if they are local LAN. If that's true, it sounds disingenuous to say there is no DRM.

See: https://getsatisfaction.com/mojang/topics/why_is_there_drm_in_this_game_when_it_is_advertised_as_drm_free

Are you saying otherwise?

Although Minecraft is DRM free, it still requires server-side activation.

That sounds like an oxymoron to me. All game developers like to tell you that their product is DRM-free. A "DRM-free" product means you'll get people like GP using your product as positive examples in debates about DRM. EA don't say that their product has DRM, they say it has exciting multiplayer capabilities, and that allowing offline support would ruin the game.

What if it's too late by then? What if Microsoft wait until it's gotten to the point where every major software vendor is selling through the Windows Store and then cuts out sideloading? Why don't you ditch Windows now and be part of the solution, and not the problem?

Well put. I just want to add that while the first two are just fighting fire with fire, the third point is actually a public benefit of patents.

The stupidity of that third argument is that it is a public benefit of patents for virtually all endeavours except open source. Open source is already open by definition. There is absolutely no additional public benefit to having an invention described in a deliberately confusing, twisted and generic legalese document, when you already have the complete working source code and (hopefully) documentation available on the Internet. Patents do not help people understand inventions. That was their original intention, but it has long since been corrupted by lawyers.

So yes, totally agree. These arguments do not show any net benefit of the patent system for open source.

My brother bought a Blu-ray player last year. I shit you not: there was a feature bullet list on the box, and one of the bullet points was "Secure protected content."

They are actually advertising DRM as a feature now... give me a break.

I would really love to agree with you, but I think you're wrong.

Even if every browser maker on the planet suddenly co-opted to every demand by the entertainment industry, people would simply stop using newer web browsers.

You really think that Joe Everybody is going to reject the automatic update on Internet Explorer when the DRM update comes in? No, if browser manufacturers go down this route, you can guarantee that 95% of the planet will have a DRM-ready web browser installed within a week.

They can't win the war by swaying public opinion -- the public is stupid. Very stupid. Monumentally stupid... but not that stupid.

Are you sure? Hell, even half the people on Slashdot seem to have fallen into the mindless "piracy is theft" propaganda trap. Scroll through this page to find at least a dozen comments that say "sure, DRM is annoying, but if you don't like DRM then you must be a thief." The public is grossly swayed on this issue by the media companies. Yes, a lot of people pirate things, but in my experience, the very same people who don't give a shit about copyright law (the pirates) also don't give a shit about DRM. They'll work around it. They won't fight against it. Everybody else, well they'll just see the word "protected" and think that's a good thing.

You argue that the Internet will always allow the free flow of information -- I think you're probably right about that. But this isn't about whether it will be possible to get a pirate feed of some movie in the future -- I guarantee you will be able to. This is about legitimate uses of technology. In the future, it will be illegal to consume media and also use free software. The only way to do it will be by breaking the law. That's what the problem is.

Worse, even if I don't give a shit about Big Copyright's media, and want nothing to do with it, I'll still have to buy into their DRM because it will be illegal to sell hardware without it.

Netflix isn't going touch hardware or sorfware you already own.

That would be fine if I wasn't planning to buy another computer for the rest of my life. Unfortunately, I've noticed that computers don't last terribly long, so while I'm not worried about them infecting my current computer with malware (DRM forcibly installed in the hardware is malware), I certainly am worried about my next computer. At the rate we're going, I certainly won't have a choice in the matter, so don't act like there is consumer choice here.

you don't have good reading comprehension.

Thanks, that's a really nice way to start a conversation.

They promise not to randomly share SPI (which may not mean you think it means) to random individuals (e.g., making it publicly available) but they can provide it to business partners. The kicker is that your identity is not considered SPI, nor is your location, nor information about your economic or financial situation.

Where are you getting the definition? From the glossary linked to by the privacy policy, personal information "is information which you provide to us which personally identifies you, such as your name, email address or billing information, or other data which can be reasonably linked to such information by Google."

So wherever the privacy policy mentions "personal information", it includes anything that could be used to link your data back to your real identity. What that means is that advertisers may be given your other information (such as your interests), but only in aggregate form, and they would not be able to link it back to your real identity without being in violation of this privacy policy.

but they can provide it to business partners

If you read the privacy policy carefully, I believe (and this is just my reading; remember that I don't have good reading comprehension) that they couldn't get away with providing personal information to trusted business partners for any reason. The policy states:

We provide personal information to our affiliates or other trusted businesses or persons to process it for us

Emphasis mine. That means that they would be able to hire a third party to perform data aggregation or the like. The data would specifically have to be used by this third party to process the data on Google's behalf. They would not be able to use this data for their own arbitrary purposes without violating this privacy policy.

which their "privacy" policy is ballsy enough to mention some particularly nasty aspects of

You say it like it's a bad thing that they had the "balls" to make it so clear what they were doing, as if you'd consider it better somehow if they jumbled it up in a long legal document. Isn't this what we've been asking companies to do all along -- provide clear and transparent policies on what they are doing with our data?

I won't deny that it is a hell of a lot of information, considering that Google has a piece of JavaScript on most non-Google web pages. But I'm happy to see that, given that's the underlying technology, they have a really clear privacy policy that, to me, seems to protect my interests and limit third-party access to my data to acceptable levels.

Okay, so those approximately match my first and second sharing types in my list of three. For #1, they state that they will not do this in the new policy:

We do not share personal information with companies, organizations and individuals outside of Google unless...

The "unless" includes a bunch of exceptions, which I don't see as a big deal but you may disagree. In summary, a) if you give them permission, b) if you have a domain administrator (doesn't apply to normal users), c) with a third party affiliate for "processing", which must also agree to the privacy policy (not quite sure what that means), d) if compelled to by a court.

For #2, that isn't what they meant at all by "sharing information between services". It does NOT imply that, for example, your calendar would be randomly shared on Google+. It only means that they will share data with you and you alone, across services (for example, to give you relevant results and ads). If you haven't used Google+, the sharing is very straightforward and very tightly controlled: only things you explicitly post on there get shared, and every time you share something, it explicitly asks that you nominate a group of people or individuals to share it with, and once posted, that group of people cannot be changed.

Maybe it is not because Google will combine the privacy policies into a single one, but also all the users data across all its services?

Yep, that's certainly the idea. Note that most of Google's existing privacy policies already did give them the ability to share user's data across all its services. For example, YouTube already shows videos that your friends share on Google+. The problem was that they were inconsistent. Google cannot currently share data from YouTube with other sites. Their new policy allows them to do that. This is all explained in their letter to U.S. Congress.

Now what exactly is the problem with this? It seems to me that if Google is going to share my data, there are three sets of people they could share it with:

• Third-party companies, such as advertisers (e.g., selling your personal data for profit)
• Your social connections (e.g., sharing your personal information without your permission)
• You (e.g., showing you ads relevant to your interests)

I see a significant harm if they were to engage in the first two. I don't really have a problem with the third. And this privacy policy specifically prevents them from doing the first two. So what this allows them to do is share my information, from one Google service to another, for the purposes of showing me relevant links and ads. In that case, where is the harm? Further, how am I worse off having, for example, Google search results informed by what YouTube videos I've been watching. It sounds like it could give me more relevant search results.

Further, I would much rather know that anything I upload to any Google service might be used by any other Google service, than have to remember a complex set of rules about which products' privacy policies allow Google to share data with which other products.

Perhaps the move will no longer let you share individual services data, like sharing your Google+ data but withhold your Calendar?

What does this mean? What do you mean by "share" in this context? Withhold your Calendar from whom? As far as I am concerned, the only people who have access to my calendar are me and Google's servers. If the Google+ app had access to my calendar (for example, it might show appointments on the side), that doesn't increase the people who have access to my calendar: It's still just me and Google's servers.

Since when did any company give you explicit control over how the data is stored on their servers? With Google's new policy, it is simple: if you use a service, your data for that service will be stored on Google and may be used by any other service within that company (and not sold to third parties). How is that harmful? How is that different to any other company?

Then in that case, the delay (which will vary based on the operation) will require that the public cannot monitor police radios. They would have to come up with an alternative mechanism for distributing radio chatter to the public, perhaps via the Internet.

But I'm curious as to why they need to be published at all. We do not publish private conversations between police officers at the station, so why do we need to publish their long-distance communication?

There has been a lot of attention on government transparency in recent years, due to WikiLeaks and so on. But it seems as though police radio is exactly the sort of thing that should be exempt from government transparency -- it pertains to operations that are going on right now, and disclosing those details immediately in public could compromise those operations. I don't see the problem with police security.