The article claims there were 300,000 songs infringed and the cost per infringement is $20,000. That only comes out to $6 billion. So something somewhere is incorrect. Either the math or the source numbers.
Good catch. Michael Geist sent a tweet about that recently.
Thanks to @niespika for pointing out embarrassing math error - record label liability could exceed $6 billion, not $60B.
He's updated the article on his main site with the correct figure of $6 billion:
http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/4596/135/
I have been to the bar in question in this article, and have to say in theory I have no problem with what they're trying to accomplish. As stated elsewhere, this has nothing to do with avoiding selling booze to minors. A standard ID check is enough for that (current BC drivers licenses are very difficult to forge. I have yet to see a fake one, and would figure the skills and equipment required to produce a fake put it way out of reach of your typical teenager wanting to buy alcohol.)
The procedure for entering these bars is to discourage criminals (i.e. gang members) from entering the premises, and in the case a violent incident does occur, provide an ability to track the perpetrators as efficiently as possible. The execution of these procedures is done very fairly as well. The bouncers are courteous (as long as you are, I'm sure) and treat everyone the same -- no "You're hot, you don't need to participate" bias that I've seen. Everyone lines up. Everyone gets patted down. Everyone scans their ID. Everyone smiles for the camera. It's very quick and smooth if you don't make a big deal out of it.
People who think this reeks of "police state" need to remember this is a private business you can choose to either enter, or not enter. If you want to enter, you have to abide by their rules.
Should anything bad go down in the bar that night, they have an exact record of everyone who was in the bar, as well as current-as-of-that-night photos of them. More then anything, having the patrons all know that acts as a huge deterrent. The bar in question used to have problems with "thugs". I have heard of no problems since they implemented the system. I actually enjoy going there knowing I don't have to worry about some of the violent problems that other bars have.
That being said, there are definitely some changes that could be made to improve the process for everyone. I could definitely see bouncers getting irritated by patrons questioning their policies, but I'm guessing it's mainly because they don't really know the nitty-gritty details as it's just their job to get people through the system as quickly as possible. This would create tension and bad vibes between patrons and the bar, which is probably what leads to complaints and court cases like this.
Creating a fair and acceptable privacy policy, adhering to it (and maybe have an independent audit proving that they do adhere to it), and educating the bouncers to be able to answer questions regarding it would go a long way into gaining users trust of the system. Even have printed copies of the privacy policy available for customers to step aside and read before making a decision to enter the bar to keep the line flowing.
TFA links to a photo tour of Opera's in-house data center, which Google can translate pretty well for some extra information:
Translated photo gallery: http://72.14.213.132/translate_c?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&sl=no&tl=en&u=http://www.digi.no/504306/her-kjores-egentlig-opera-mini%26bid%3D3&prev=_t&rurl=translate.google.com&usg=ALkJrhi9EJIJDyjFQXWO9b78y47p_hBSaQ
The album, which cost millions and took 17 years to complete, was released November 23 and reached No. 3 in the charts. The sentence being sought -- including the calculation of damages based on the illegal activity of as many as 1,310 websites that disseminated the music after Cogill released it -- underscores how serious the government is about punishing those for uploading pre-release material.
Are they trying to insinuate that because this album cost millions of dollars more to develop than most albums should, that pirating it is in some way worse because it will take even longer for them to recuperate such losses?
News flash big business: if you spend 10x as long, and 10x as much money as anyone else in that industry would on creating a product, it is not society's responsibility to compensate you. You deserve to lose money, and probably deserve to go out of business over the project.
Besides the ridiculous cost and timeline for developing the album, it seems the primary stakeholders were determined to tank this project regardless (see: http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/india-news/axl-rose-blamed-for-band-missing-no-1-album_100126311.html/). Blaming piracy for any financial difficulties this album has suffered is more ridiculous than usual.
Radioshack and (if you're on the West coast) Frys still sell niche components, but from the looks of it Radioshack has been in a painfully long losing battle with oblivion since the early nineties.
In Canada, Radioshack was actually bought out by Circuit City a few years ago. They're now all named The Source by Circuit City. I wonder how this news it going to affect them. I'm guessing it won't be good because, by my accounts, they had been closing down many of the stores since CC bought them anyway.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RadioShack#Operations_in_Canada
RTS is pretty much a dead genre.
I'd say Starcraft 2, an RTS, is one of the most anticipated releases of 2009. Not to mention the original Starcraft still has a huge following, and it is still one of the only games you could make a reasonable living off of if you were good enough, especially in Korea or China. Some matches are even broadcast on TV over there. I've watched some online and it's actually relatively entertaining with a good commentator/colour commentator duo.
Kill Ugly Processor Architectures - Karl Lehenbauer