This was mentioned in the article, but not as size, but weight. The power to weight ratio is more important. Density of the individual battery cells, and continuous use vs. burst usage also come into play.
How about a "targeted" email of the results of this study to all online advertisers. Certainly it's important enough that they won't mind receiving 2 or 3 copies since it's "business relevant". We do want to make sure these people are inconvenienced, er I mean informed.
Good luck. The first hurdle in creating an amendment to the Constitution is that it has to be passed by a 2/3 majority of Congress. If the **AA's can get over %50 to pass the Sonny Bono Copyright Extension Act, then they can easily get over %33 to stall an amendment.
I'd be curious to hear what players of the old pen and paper RPG version of Champions think. The best part of the game was the separation of game mechanics from character type. It sounds like CO got that part right. The differences between normal, killing, no normal defense, and ego/psi attacks also made for interesting character variety. Combat in the original RPG was somewhat tedious and arithmetic-intensive. The review mentions "killing" henchmen. One of the hallmarks of the RPG were characters with "Code Vs. Killing" psychological limitations. What world would accept superheroes who casually walk into a fight and kill their enemies?
One problem that the music and movie industries have created for themselves with consolidation, is that the large overhead of the consolidated organizations has exacerbated the need for a multi-platinum CD or a blockbuster movie bringing in $500 million in order to be profitable. In a feast-or-famine sink-or-swim environment there is little opportunity for independent artists (film-makers or bands) to develop. The *AA only see immediate return on investment.
In the music industry especially, the larger labels will add in contractual obligations to spend %X of the advance on recording, using a pre-approved list of producers and studios. Of course the label has a financial interest in these studios/producers, and by having these stipulations in the contract, get to squeeze more profit from the artist by essentially being paid twice, once when the artist uses his/her advance, and again when the label recoups the advance from royalties.
Indie bands, singer-songwriters and other artists that don't get much airplay, and rely on touring to survive, have found it much easier to be profitable off smaller sales volume by either recording for an independent label, or forming their own label. The artist then controls his/her costs, rather than suffer the label inflating the costs to compensate for not selling X million copies.
No, for several reasons.
1.) Having recorded for nearly 30 years, Al knows the ins and outs of what's legal, what he can easily fight, and what he can't.
2.) The original songwriter is credited on all parodies (and polka medleys) meaning Al pays royalties to the original songwriter on all songs recorded on CD or receiving airplay. ASCAP and the original artist are making money from Al.
3.) Al gets permission from the artist before recording a parody, even though it isn't legally necessary. In the case of parodying James Blunt's "You're Beautiful" (as "You're Pitiful") the label (not the artist) withheld permission after recording, so instead of releasing it on the "Straight out of Lynwood" CD, he put out an mp3 from his website. Other parodies for which he doesn't have artist permission, he will perform live in concert, but will not record.
More details at his Wikipedia page.
Compuware had 3 essential tools for mainframe development (IBM 370)
Abend-Aid - automated dump solver for when you program core-dumped.
File-Aid - Easily the best file browser for the mainframe. I'd love to see a similar tool on Windows or Linux that allowed you to create customized text and binary file formats for viewing file innards.
Xpediter - mainframe debugger.
Actually, Micro Focus made a great deal of cash in the nineties by providing COBOL development on the PC. COBOL programmers who were maintaining applications on a mainframe were no longer tied to an 8-color terminal connected at 9600 baud, or by using a terminal-emulation program that was just as bad. Compuware also put out a number of mainframe tools that were heavily used. I wonder if Micro Focus got those as well?
Bill is sponsored by Rep. Mary Bono. Big surprise. She was behind the 1998 Sunny Bono Copyright Extension Act and has worked very closely with the RIAA and MPAA in the past.
From the CNET article:
Bono's Informed P2P User Act says that it will be "unlawful" for P2P software to cause files to be made available unless two rules are followed. First, the utility's installation process must provide "clear and conspicuous notice" of its features and obtain the user's "informed consent." Second, the program must step through that notice-and-consent process every time it runs.
In other words: a "This gun shoots bullets, which may be lethal." notice every time the program is used, made further annoying by a list of all files that would be shared.
Should a user have a way of finding out exactly what the software they are using is doing, and an easy way to configure it correctly? Absolutely. Should it provide a way for me to view the configuration and what it will share? Hopefully, and I'd look for software that does. Does that mean all software should be dumbed down, and force me to go through such a notice every time I use it? Absolutely not. Of course the end result will be no different than what users currently do with EULA notices during software installation.
All in all a law requireing a bad and onerous implementation of what a good program should do anyway, and potentially the thin end of a wedge to add more restrictions to P2P software. The law could be used to go after some forms of spyware, but I'd much rather see a law carefully crafted for that purpose.
Perhaps, but Perens Pox would probably work even better
Al, is that you?
I want to read this year's Halloween memo.
When a group that exploits a communication network system for information is also in charge of its security, what happens when a weakness is found? Do you:
A) Keep the weakness secret so you can exploit it.
B) Publish the fix so your networks are fixed, but also allowing those you may be monitoring to fix as well, and cut off an information source.
Bruce Schneier has a great commentary on this at his blog.
Given the age of the older microwave links, plus the fact they were doing the processing, but were bandwidth-limited, it's probable that they've had the storage and processing power for a while, but the bandwidth infrastructure is now just catching up.
"Here's something to think about: How come you never see a headline like `Psychic Wins Lottery.'" -- Comedian Jay Leno
