exactly.

essentially, the browser is now the new plugin.

for all the ranting and raving about HTML5 and all the "they've been pushing for it for a while now" ... the tooling still sucks and so the go to market time for anything except the most simple of applications is too long to justify its adoption.

It's the same with Silverlight. Too many decision makers are opting to cancel development using it in lieu of using HTML5 .. when realistically the same application either couldn't even be made, or would take at least twice as long to complete.

conversely, if you spent more time and money on the game rather than marketing, that 'small group' of people that follow the game releases would be more dedicated to supporting the product, ergo your need for getting the word out in 'traditional' marketing veins would be decreased. Then, just like you want, people will start telling other people that they should go buy the game because the game maker actually took the effort to make it badass, instead of some lame, reinvention of the wheel with adverts and long load screens and bad AI, not to mention bugs that will never get fixed. Most game companies spend so much on marketing because they've sold their integrity for greed and status quo. Ironically, in this system, they have themselves to blame. They wind up telling the consumer what they want, and then forcing it down their throats, then blaming them for their lack of sales (of the crappy game), crying it's because of piracy or whatever else, EXCEPT improving the game by spending more on development. It's one thing to add devs mid-development ... it's another, completely, to plan for more devs up front, and less marketing.

If you build it, they will come. If you say you built it, and there is just an empty field, you may have gotten your admission ticket, but your return sales are going to suck. The corporate mentality nowadays is that someone else 'copied' your 'great idea' and is giving it away for free. What really happened is that once the people you tried to fool realized it's just an empty field you're charging admission for ... they started going to the public park because you offered nothing substantive for consumption.

I think you've got that bet backwards:

I'd guess that those who oppose health care/insurance reform, are the same people that want their 'due privacy' .. as another commenter pointed out .. so that they can be one of the hypocritical masses who prefer to shun the taboo activities in public, but want to practice their taboo activity in private. Those who don't want to share the 'burden' of health care would similarly not want to share their information, and thus would be offended by those who would prefer to live in a society where hypocrisy & fear do not reign, hand in hand.

You're onto something that the fearful will never understand, and will forever fight as hard against it as they can.

It's like pride and your perceived abstraction from pride-hurting activities trump freedom.

Many more people than are willing to accept it yearn for the womb every day of their lives.

It's a chat program.

It's job is to run while 'idle'

How about getting up in arms about general bad programming that causes the software to run slower/harder/etc ... churning up CPU?

all the same, i wouldn't want to have to deal with this.

You're right .. why would they?

Except that they are only granted the ability to sell/license the creative works for a limited time solely for the benefit of society/culture/creativity.

However, I don't think copyright needs to go away, just cut waaay back. If there were no limits to what you could/could not copy, too much would be pushed aside/lost in the wash, or too many cases would be making their way to the judicial branch of your local/state/fed govt.

I have been actively involved in music my entire life. I know many musicians who want nothing to do with big labels and corporations who take your music, morph it into what they think or simply what they want to sell, make you a deal you can't refuse, and finally hold the copyright for 99 years, or sell it back to you for more than you ever made off it.
Meanwhile that same schmuck that ruined your music by adding the standard flip flop flap crap is kickin' back probably is the same mf'er that got your shit leaked in the first place, or didn't promote to his boss hard enough because you didn't hire him a hooker and an 8-ball of coke... (Completely bypassing the notion that your failure couldn't possibly have been the result of his amazing producing skills ... that he thinks are so good because he's being paid so disproportionately when compared to the quality of his work. And let's not forget that all these producers (that you would probably not know by name, but whom have changed that 'awesome sound' your favorite band used to have before 'they sold out' ) create almost every bit of music the same way, every time. The time signatures, phrasing, melodies, subject matter ... pretty much the whole damn thing ... sounds like a pre-fabricated, cookie-cutter POS.

To the industry: Get a clue already! Music we make sounds better because there are more of us, doing more things, from wider backgrounds with greater ranges of influence and collaboration, all at an incredibly far faster pace than your 'ollld, wrinkly balls' can handle (Adam Sandler - Big Daddy lulz). Why do you think the underground remix/hip-hop/etc scene is so huge? Why do you think artists like Girl Talk are so popular? Checked out the Hype Machine lately? How about TheSixtyOne? Probably only to disenfranchise your consumers more by wiping their blog, forcing their ISP's to start monitoring the data they transfer, and doing everything in your power to make sure that 99 year copyright makes you that golden buck.

One of my friends likes to say about record labels/industry:
It's like going hunting with Dick Cheney ... You may get lucky and shoot some quail, but odds are you're always having to keep an eye out over your shoulder to make sure that old crazy fuck with the bad heart doesn't make swiss cheese out of your pride, joy, and countless hours of painstaking practice..

more of the same rant: http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1273015&cid=28376327

I think they tried that with the anti-piracy movie ads didn't they? Get actors who they think kids like and will 'listen to' just like they did with cigarettes and beer and drugs and violence ...

Except kids don't mind paying for shit they have to buy to have a good time carrying on with the tradition of debauchery. Stick it to the man! Need a pack of cigarettes or that 12-pack of natty? An underage kid will handily pay some bum on the street and even tip him if he can pull it off without getting the kids in trouble.

The problem, as I see it, is that music is NOT consumable in the same way as beer/cigs/drugs. This is why Sony put rootkits on their discs, why early game consoles tried to sign the disc to the console so it couldn't be used elsewhere, why everyone wants a proprietary format if they hold the market share, and why vinyl records fell out of style/function.

Yes, I know vinyl is making a comeback, and that's because it's unique to the market. It's good'ol fashioned analog sound. I'm sure the record companies didn't expect that reducing the frequency range in the music they produced, so they could squeeze more crap onto an album to make consumers feel better about the money they just spent wasted, while gradually increasing the volume to account for lesser frequency range & longer recordings ... would eventually bring the fuller, richer sound of vinyl back into the mainstream ...

But back to the point. Music is not consumable in the same right. It'd be one thing if the record industry was in it for the true reasons why copyright/IP were started .. to foster creativity/culture. We all know this already but it can only help to push the agenda (i sound so evil) to have billions of people feverishly trying to pry back from the gluttonous, corporate hands our creativity and culture.

As society advances faster and faster and faster, and children born today will learn/absorb much more in their lifetime than anyone reading this now will and at a much faster rate with better and better tech at each step of the way. As this happens the velocity of culture (and what we consider copyright today) through our societies will necessarily increase at the same rate, if not faster.

Sooner, rather than later, much more of society will realize very quickly that copyright is not serving the public's best interest as far as music/creativity/culture are concerned. There is and endless amount of media out there that will make it's way across the globe simply by word of mouth, viral internet hype, etc. Those who make the best music/are the most creative, are those doing it for the creativity alone.

We've evolved away from needing the stringent IP/CR because we are so much more capable. It no longer requires 10's of thousands of dollars to produce a quality album: just practice and technology. We're there, ladies and gentleman. Youngsters being driven to innovate by the insatiable need to contribute to the ever-changing landscape of today/tomorrow's new trends before it's too late is simply cold, hard fact.

Old habits die slow, and it's nigh impossible to teach an old dog new tricks. It's time to put this one down.

Howard the Duck!

If only this were true.

However, I feel the next revolution to our worlds will be things that function just as you suspect. Perhaps this will come in the form of bionics, or simply more advanced materials, conductors, energy production, that function solely to provide additional resources via non-standard means. If we could translate the tapping of your foot while you're peeved at your computer for burning too much CPU (or your ADHD is going off the charts and YOU'RE trying to do too much at once) into more CPU cycles, the technological world would be a much more intuitive, ergonomic, and ... intelligent.

But sadly, a user-sensing-cpu, to me, means that that for hardcore users (or simply not habitual), you're going to always be wishing you could turn off that 'annoying POS feature that makes your computer slow to respond >:'.

Why is everyone missing the point of the numbers quoted above.

If 1000 people transfer the 1 SEK, assuming the law firm's bank-transfer-allotment is 100% unused, then the firm makes 1000.

If 1500 people transfer the 1 SEK, the firm gets 0 SEK, because every transfer over 1000 constitutes a charge to the account holder of 2 SEK.

If 2000 people transfer 1 SEK, the firm now owes the bank 1000 SEK.

You do realize you just did the same thing, right?

There, fixed that for you ;-)

Download VMWare and make a snapshot if you're that up in arms about it. Or track changes to the registry and post what those changes are before you run around in a circle with your hands in the air, crying wolf.

oh i do. both renditions are equally pathetic, frankly.

I don't think 'average joe' (avg american) and 'joe sixpack' (avg american is an alcoholic couch-potato) are anywhere NEAR equatable. I guess that's why McCain/Palin road the FAILBOAT all the way home ..

the point being that, as a representation of the typical computer-illiterate American, it is simply wrong.

Let's look at what 'Joe Sixpack' really means.

This is by no means a representation of an average American. Remember, we're the obese country?

Why anyone ever jumped on this stupid bandwagon is beyond me...

However, it does lend to some funny break-down: Are we saying meat-heads are somehow dumbed down?


All jokes aside, the state of our country's computer literacy is a joke. If one this is for sure, we should be teaching kids how to troubleshoot & fix issues with computers, not just 'use the features' like a black box.

Ever heard ... "If you can't do it, you teach it."

I think you just proved your point, but I don't agree with the assertion that Microsoft is aiding in that endeavor.

It's the nature of the beast, not the environment in which the beast thrives...