Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 19 Mar 2012 @ 2:49am
Re: Re: Correct
Can't have it both ways, can you?
Dear Oolon,
Reality is not black and white no matter how much paint you use, nor are there only 2 options no matter how hard you ignore the others. This is even more true when you are dealing with hypothetical and potential future events.
Sincerely
- The Universe.
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 19 Mar 2012 @ 2:35am
Re: Re: ok ok ok
I'm not the only lost customer who said that.
Indeed you are not. Other games companies are still getting my money, but not Ubisoft any more despite me having a shelf-full of previous Ubisoft titles. Good games usually, but unusable and worthless product. And I suspect that Ubisoft themselves, very much like our AC here, can't see the difference between the two.
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 19 Mar 2012 @ 2:24am
Re:
Wow! I've just read through the thread (15 minutes of my life I'm never going to get back)and I think I've figured out who you are. You're Oolon Colluphid aren't you?
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 17 Mar 2012 @ 9:30am
Re: Re: Re:
Actually, I was trying to point out the bias of this post.
"I was trying to manufacture a non-existant bias in this post so I can rant about Masnick again"
There FTFY
If you'd actually bothered to read the article:
Former Congressman Steve Largent (R-OK) has made at least $8,815,741 over the years as a lobbyist for a coalition of cell phone companies and related wireless industry interests.
Sounds like an example of someone linked to a tech industry to me.
For those without a one track brain the article was about how it might it doesn't look terribly good for ANY people who write laws go get buckets of cash from the people the laws are supposed to affect straight after.
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 17 Mar 2012 @ 5:38am
Re:
But this childish rant was lame.
The only rant I can see is yours and it misses the point. $4 may not be much for a whole season of content, but whether they like it or not they're competing with other non-official offerings and as has been pointed out by others in the comments the official offering is limited. Which of these sounds more attractive?
1/ $4 for something that allows you to watch a single game at a time, forces you to watch and listen to ads, and requires a specific application that may or may not work on the device that you want to use.
2/ $0 for watching as many games simultaneously as your connection will support, being able to turn off ads you don't want and no application tie-in so it's pretty much guaranteed to work where you want it.
It's not quite that simple of course since legitimacy has value in and of itself and on the other side there's also the emotional response of "hang on a minute they could provide this free and now they want money for it?". Normally when something free starts costing there's usually at least the illusion of better service (value) and there doesn't appear to be in this case
Whether the $4 is worth it or not (and I don't care either way, not interested enough to watch for free even if it were "allowed" in my country), some people who watched for free last year are not going to pay to watch and the legitimate (and non-ranting) question in the article is whether the lost viewers are worth more than the gained subscription fees.
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 16 Mar 2012 @ 12:07pm
Re: Re: Re: COMPETITION? NUUUUUU
It's funny and ironic because Apple is literally the modern posterchild for exactly the opposite of the point you're making.
Actually I'm not sure you're completely correct there. I have a suspicion that in troll-speak "innovative" actually means "vastly profitable and litigious" or possibly "prettier and shinier than everyone elses version of the same thing".
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 16 Mar 2012 @ 9:47am
The man is insane!!!
and a complete, open-minded understanding of why people might choose your competitors.
But all you need to know is that all people who buy or use your products are filthy sneaky freetard thieves and there can't possibly be ANY other reason at all why ANY other product than what you, in your infinite wisdom and graciousness, choose to grudgingly give them should even be allowed to exist never mind being allowed to exist un-sued!!!!
.........
OOooooo that was wierd I suddendly came over all AAlternative reality.....
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 15 Mar 2012 @ 4:06pm
Re: Re: Re:
Nice troll. Managing to imply that things paid and locked up in patents for are sooo much better and fit-for-purpose and secure than those nasty dirty horrible (*gasp*) free things... Yep managed to completely snow me with that one. Oh, no.. wait... um... I forgot about every Microsoft product ever.
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 15 Mar 2012 @ 9:55am
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Hollywood's remaining life
That's kind of the problem. Hollywood is obsessed with numbers, and even something like Girl With the Dragon Tattoo somehow costs $90 million (the original Swedish movie cost just $13 million).
And I'd pick the "low budget" original over the Hollywood remake in a heartbeat. Same with Nikita vs Assassin and a hoard of others. It sometimes seems that everything Hollywood touches turns to braindead.
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 15 Mar 2012 @ 7:42am
Re: Re: Re: Hollywood's remaining life
They already can. Those movies don't make enough money to challenge Avatar, however, so are often ignored by the industry.
Which is a shame. I'm trying to think of any film with an Avatar-like budget which I'd actually consider "good" rather than just mindlessly entertaining and I'm coming up short. I've nothing against mindlessly entertaining, I'd just like a little more non-mindless too.
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 14 Mar 2012 @ 4:09pm
Re:
Yeah instead, like most other things, it's only possible if you use an infringing copy or at least one that hollywood would dearly love to be infringing. As you say, way to go! Bluray as a technology was pretty well obsolete before it "won" the format war with DVD-HD and yet again and again they refuse to sell content in a format that people actually want, then winge again and again about how less people are buying the product. 8-track anyone?
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 14 Mar 2012 @ 3:44pm
Re: Re: Re:
Seriously? I'm a crook for thinking that not wanting to eat only hollywood sanctioned popcorn with a film is reasonable? *looks strenuously for "bat-shit insane" button again*
Let's try this ONCE more: We are talking about a product here that does it's level best to FORCE you to BUY a DVD first in order to use it and Hollywood thinks this is a BAD idea.
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 14 Mar 2012 @ 12:01pm
Re:
Seeing that plenty of websites have terms that require you to upload only material you have the rights too, and yet are packed with pirated material... it seems like an empty promise.
And again I find myself looking for a "bat-shit insane" button and having to settle for "funny".
More than anything else this article highlights the stupidity and greed of the studios.
Stupidity because there are literally hundreds of software products that will do exactly this for you just fine, better in fact, and without all the restrictions and well within the competance of even a basic computer user. Here is a company that's TRYING to put as much protection in as possible, far MORE protection in fact than hollywood ever added, trying to play the studio's game and GIVE THEM A CHANCE AT MAKING MORE MONEY by making their product more valuable. Do the studios embrace it? Do they say "thank you for making our irrelevant plastic discs vaguely relevant again"? No, instead they AGAIN leave anyone who wants this kind of functionality no legitimate route just hundreds and hundreds of illegitimate ones. That has to be the very epitome of stupidity - literally making criminals out of customers.
As for greed, it again makes it clear that the studios want and expect to control every single thing about a movie forever, trying to dictate when and how you can watch it, who with, what equipment you can use, how often you're allowed to watch it, whether you're allowed to think about it or offer an opinion on it. What's next? Specially sanctioned "official popcorn"?
I can only assume you yourself work for a studio. Noone else could be THAT deliberately obtuse about what this company has tried to do, can they?
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 10 Mar 2012 @ 11:02am
Re: Re:
Sadly there is no "bat-shit insane" button. I'm also wondering if I now theoretically need to generate a cheque and send it somewhere in payment for the laughter and sadness generated.
Not an Electronic Rodent (profile), 10 Mar 2012 @ 10:43am
Re: Re: Why bother hacking code...
Once the software and hardware become too difficult to hack, that leaves the people, and you can't always secure them...
Even basic hardware/encryption is usually more secure than the average user and it's often cultural for the organisation to some extent. The same organisation that will lay out 10,000's of dollars/pounds on cool security gizmos/ IPS / Secure ID tokens etc are all too often the same ones where you can't get anyone senior outside of IT itself to care that users write their passwords on paper and stick them to the monitor.
Can remember running a standard off the shelf password cracker on the user database a number of years ago for an organisation I worked for. Within 10 minutes it had 80% of the passwords (~200 users) and less than 3% lasted the 12 hour run (unsuprisingly mostly the IT dept passwords). On the strength of that I managed to insist on password strength limitations being implemented, but even then it took serious arguing to not have that rolled back when the users started complaining.
On the post: Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt
Re: Re: Correct
Reality is not black and white no matter how much paint you use, nor are there only 2 options no matter how hard you ignore the others. This is even more true when you are dealing with hypothetical and potential future events.
Sincerely
- The Universe.
On the post: Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt
Re: Re: ok ok ok
On the post: Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt
Re:
On the post: Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt
Re:
On the post: Elected Officials Get An Average 1,452% Salary Increase When They Take A Lobbying Job
Re: Re: Re:
"I was trying to manufacture a non-existant bias in this post so I can rant about Masnick again"
There FTFY
If you'd actually bothered to read the article:
Sounds like an example of someone linked to a tech industry to me.
For those without a one track brain the article was about how it might it doesn't look terribly good for ANY people who write laws go get buckets of cash from the people the laws are supposed to affect straight after.
On the post: NCAA Goes Backwards On Streaming The Basketball Tournament
Re:
The only rant I can see is yours and it misses the point. $4 may not be much for a whole season of content, but whether they like it or not they're competing with other non-official offerings and as has been pointed out by others in the comments the official offering is limited. Which of these sounds more attractive?
1/ $4 for something that allows you to watch a single game at a time, forces you to watch and listen to ads, and requires a specific application that may or may not work on the device that you want to use.
2/ $0 for watching as many games simultaneously as your connection will support, being able to turn off ads you don't want and no application tie-in so it's pretty much guaranteed to work where you want it.
It's not quite that simple of course since legitimacy has value in and of itself and on the other side there's also the emotional response of "hang on a minute they could provide this free and now they want money for it?". Normally when something free starts costing there's usually at least the illusion of better service (value) and there doesn't appear to be in this case
Whether the $4 is worth it or not (and I don't care either way, not interested enough to watch for free even if it were "allowed" in my country), some people who watched for free last year are not going to pay to watch and the legitimate (and non-ranting) question in the article is whether the lost viewers are worth more than the gained subscription fees.
On the post: Copying Leads To Competition, Competition Leads To Innovation
Re: Re: Re: COMPETITION? NUUUUUU
On the post: Copying Leads To Competition, Competition Leads To Innovation
The man is insane!!!
But all you need to know is that all people who buy or use your products are filthy sneaky freetard thieves and there can't possibly be ANY other reason at all why ANY other product than what you, in your infinite wisdom and graciousness, choose to grudgingly give them should even be allowed to exist never mind being allowed to exist un-sued!!!!
.........
OOooooo that was wierd I suddendly came over all AAlternative reality.....
On the post: Celebrating 20 Years Of Patent-Free Email Attachments
Re: Re: Re:
On the post: When Entertainment Industry Numbers Are More Suited To Comedy Than Analysis
Re: Re: Yer Funny....
3/10
On the post: Why Anti-Circumvention Laws Are Evil: Hollywood Gets To Veto DVD Jukebox, Despite Complete Lack Of Infringement
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Hollywood's remaining life
And I'd pick the "low budget" original over the Hollywood remake in a heartbeat. Same with Nikita vs Assassin and a hoard of others. It sometimes seems that everything Hollywood touches turns to braindead.
On the post: Why Anti-Circumvention Laws Are Evil: Hollywood Gets To Veto DVD Jukebox, Despite Complete Lack Of Infringement
Re: Re: Re: Hollywood's remaining life
On the post: Harper's Publisher Presents The Platonic Ideal Specimen Of The 'I'm An Old Fogey Elitist Anti-Internet Luddite' Columns
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Why Anti-Circumvention Laws Are Evil: Hollywood Gets To Veto DVD Jukebox, Despite Complete Lack Of Infringement
Re:
On the post: Why Anti-Circumvention Laws Are Evil: Hollywood Gets To Veto DVD Jukebox, Despite Complete Lack Of Infringement
Re: Re: Re:
Let's try this ONCE more: We are talking about a product here that does it's level best to FORCE you to BUY a DVD first in order to use it and Hollywood thinks this is a BAD idea.
On the post: Why Anti-Circumvention Laws Are Evil: Hollywood Gets To Veto DVD Jukebox, Despite Complete Lack Of Infringement
Re:
More than anything else this article highlights the stupidity and greed of the studios.
Stupidity because there are literally hundreds of software products that will do exactly this for you just fine, better in fact, and without all the restrictions and well within the competance of even a basic computer user. Here is a company that's TRYING to put as much protection in as possible, far MORE protection in fact than hollywood ever added, trying to play the studio's game and GIVE THEM A CHANCE AT MAKING MORE MONEY by making their product more valuable. Do the studios embrace it? Do they say "thank you for making our irrelevant plastic discs vaguely relevant again"? No, instead they AGAIN leave anyone who wants this kind of functionality no legitimate route just hundreds and hundreds of illegitimate ones. That has to be the very epitome of stupidity - literally making criminals out of customers.
As for greed, it again makes it clear that the studios want and expect to control every single thing about a movie forever, trying to dictate when and how you can watch it, who with, what equipment you can use, how often you're allowed to watch it, whether you're allowed to think about it or offer an opinion on it. What's next? Specially sanctioned "official popcorn"?
I can only assume you yourself work for a studio. Noone else could be THAT deliberately obtuse about what this company has tried to do, can they?
On the post: Why It's Mathematically Impossible To Avoid Infringing On Software Patents
Re:
On the post: An Open Letter To Content Creators: One 'Pirate' Explains Why He Infringes & How To Get His Money
Re: Re:
On the post: Hollywood Hackers Vs. Reality
Re: Re: Why bother hacking code...
Can remember running a standard off the shelf password cracker on the user database a number of years ago for an organisation I worked for. Within 10 minutes it had 80% of the passwords (~200 users) and less than 3% lasted the 12 hour run (unsuprisingly mostly the IT dept passwords). On the strength of that I managed to insist on password strength limitations being implemented, but even then it took serious arguing to not have that rolled back when the users started complaining.
On the post: Michael Jackson, Pirate Remixer
Re: Re: Re: Mech v. Authorship?
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