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Comment Broken analogy. (Score 1) 63

Bulldozer flatten the physical world. AI generates content and code in the virtual world. Huge difference.

So being smart isn't a rarity anymore? Boo hoo.

When a smartphone can do a diagnosis just as good as a doctor (or better), when it can cough up a legal document that is 80% finished after 30 seconds, that's overall a good thing. Some desk jockeys like us will lose their prestigious jobs. Really no big loss for society as a hole.

The problem is, of course, that running a fascist surveillance state has just gotten 5 orders of magnitude cheaper. That sure is a problem we need to be aware of.

Comment This isn't news. Read the TOS. (Score 3, Informative) 70

The TOS of these commercial services say they basically own your content, unless it's illegal, then all the burden is on you. This has been the case ever since those services became a thing, more than 25 years ago.

That's why any computer and internet expert worth their reputation does not use these services without a throw-away alias account or for anything mission-critical.

Comment I always wait a generation. Still happy with my... (Score 3, Interesting) 45

... Xbox One X. Awesome machine. Console affordable, games dirt cheap, all the bugs ironed out. I'll be getting the Xbox Series X when that drops in price ... which is likely not going to happen for a while but is totally fine by me. I still have plenty games to play on my current main console.

I always wait until the end of a generation before I buy. I've still got 80+ games, most of them unplayed. Even my Xbox 360 library is half unused. Someday I want to finish the Orange Box on that one.

Comment Irrevocable license per 17 USC 117 (Score 3, Informative) 78

The copyright statute of Slashdot's home country defines a "copy" as a physical object in which a work is embodied, such as a book, ROM cartridge, or optical disc. The statutory license associated with ownership of a copy of a computer program includes making intermediate copies "as an essential step" in the use of the program. Title 17, United States Code, section 117. Historically, console makers and game publishers have lacked power to revoke this license with respect to a particular copy of a game that isn't online-only. With the end of video game distribution on optical disc, this license becomes revocable, and that's the problem.

Submission + - DHL introduces a trimaran sailboat line for freight.

Qbertino writes: DHL is about to launch operations of a modern sailboat freight-line in partnership with the french cargo trimaran operator VELA. The ships can carry 600 europaletts of freight and the line is set to operate across the atlantic between Caen-Ouistreham and New Haven as an option for low-emissions freight. VELA has a detailed press release on the topic. Looks like commercial sailing is moving towards critical mass again. Interesting.

Comment Right now the real temperature here ... (Score 4, Interesting) 164

... in Europe is roughly 5 degrees centigrade above worst case scenarios projected for the year 2050 back in 2016. Germany will likely crack the 40 degree mark in multiple locations at the end of this week. Once again a new heat record. I personally expect this to only get more intense in the next years until perhaps the gulf stream completely shuts down.

These are cascading effects kicking in and ramping up. It wouldn't stop if the planet went net-zero carbon tomorrow. So we're pretty f*cked, as predicted ever since 1970. I'm curious how hard though. Guess we'll find out soon.

Comment Wikipedia is incomplete ... (Score 2, Interesting) 214

... in some parts, contains bucketloads of over-the-top excess trivia in others and has sections that are flat-out provably false. If the sections chiefs don't think an article is important, they delete it. That's why poets important to the development of a language and culture sometimes don't even have an entry, let alone more that 3 lines while some third-grade rapper that made some noise 10 years back has an essay with 10 000 words covering every detail of their private life.

I've seen flat-out bullshit on wikipedia more than once, I've corrected some things, roughly 30% get rolled back. If an area of expertise has asshole/dimwitt chief editors (or whatever they are called in wikipedia-speak) I often just give up and don't bother.

Wikipedia is a reflection of our times and what's important to us. And it should be viewed as such. With a pound of salt.

Comment I'm basically a lead senior ... (Score 2) 33

... to my AI metasubscription now. AI does what I ask it to do, I just review the changes and commit. It's like having a personal team of 10-20 experts sitting in a chat just ready to do my bidding. It's not sitting but it doesn't feel like that too often yet.

However it's quite staggering to watch am AI so your job an order of magnitude better than yourself. And that for a bunch of software stacks a human couldn't dream to comprehend. It's also sobering to watch the value-add chains I'm supposed to automate with code being voided entirely by AI. Not only is my job gone, the context with which it makes sense is also rapidly vanishing. You should see the look on the face of the lawyers I work with when the realize how AI does away with them too.

I'm very likely going to leave my current team. I'm in the process of leaving classic Web software development as a day job. ... You guys can't imagine how glad I am not having just software and the Web as my only field of experience and expertise.

Comment Once the console's servers are shut down (Score 1) 154

Developers can make the license whatever they want including on consoles.

Not once the console maker shuts down the platform's reactivation servers.

Or say the publisher wants to publish a multiplayer game where players 2 through 4 can download a limited-functionality version of the game without charge so long as player 1 is a paying licensee and on their mutual contacts list. This resembles the model used by StarCraft spawned installations, single-Pak multiplayer on Game Boy Advance, and DS Download Play on Nintendo DS. I don't think all consoles support this sort of game sharing.

Comment Re:Two statutory carveouts: first sale and RAM cop (Score 1) 154

Which is not an ownership issue, it's a DRM/license enforcement issue.

Correct. The digital restrictions management regime on paid downloads from PlayStation Store doesn't grant rights to a licensee that are equivalent to those that the law reserves for the owner of a copy. The complaint, as I understand it, is that the required notice of inequivalence is not conspicuous enough.

The plaintiffs can still get the same benefits of the product even if their purchase is just for a license.

The benefits are not the same if the publisher or the platform gatekeeper retains the ability to remotely disable licensed software.

Comment Re:What does someone think "owning" a game would m (Score 1) 154

The only thing you really lose is the ability to resell your license easily.

Or, in the case of certain failure modes of PlayStation Store (such as end of support for a particular platform), the ability to restore your license to replacement hardware.

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As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality. -- Albert Einstein

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