What about allowing companies to set up an affiliate network, but as a guarantor of behavior instead of a simple business contract for services rendered. In other words, the affiliate is primarily responsible for the behavior that's at issue, but if the affiliate is a "throw away" account and the actual end user cannot be located then the company is on the hook for any fines and/or penalties.
This gives the company reason to (a) make sure affiliates are real people and not just throw away accounts and (b) make sure the contact info stays up to date so that any liability due to bad faith activities can be applied to the appropriate party.
The plumbers "creative work" is the creation repair of pipes and plumbing systems. Each job he completes is a "work" much the same that each novel from JRRT was a "work". When the plumber hands the "business down to an heir, the heir MUST continue to create NEW "works" or else the business will fail.
The LotR rights handed down to the heirs are still the original creative "works". The business built around the work is irrelevant (albeit profitable). In the end, JRRT and heirs still only have 4 "works" (Hobbit + 3 LotR books) that they're working with.
To compare back to the plumber, it would be as if the plumber had done all the plumbing work in Empire State Building during construction and for the rest of his life, he was paid a monthly salary. Additionally, for 70 years after his death, that monthly salary passed to his heirs. On top of all that, if anyone wanted to make changes to the plumbing in the building, they would have to license rights to do so from the plumber or his heirs. Still sound fair?
See... you added logic to the mix. They don't do that.
From my standpoint, I see it as an executive saying "We got at least one person to pay the higher price which means the product should cost the higher price to everyone. Otherwise, we're losing money."
They don't bother to look at a common price vs volume comparison because it's all about maximizing PER UNIT net profit. Most people who have seen consumer behavior in the face of a sale price vs regular priced item understand that you can drastically increase overall net profit by reducing the per item net profit. Entertainment execs don't seem to think that way.
Maybe it's because they don't buy anything on sale or actually go to the stores themselves? Yeah, yeah, that's it... they're too busy scooping up cash for themselves that they don't bother shopping with the unwashed masses... lol.
I really don't think they're interested in power as much as making sure they don't miss a single "penny of opportunity". In other words, if there is revenue to be earned in any way possible from a movie (or song in the case of the RIAA), then only they should be allowed to do so and they should get every potential penny available.
It is pure unadulterated greed driven by an irrational fear of their shareholders rather than stepping back and looking at the needs of their customers. Many corporations have fallen into the trap of believing that the shareholders and the company stock price determine the health of the company instead of their products/services and the customers that buy them. I keep hoping they'll wake up, but so far very few have shown signs of stirring.
Since we're taking it in unrealistic directions, how about another one:
Why couldn't Genzyme go back to Mt. Sinai get an expanded license allowing them to "sub-license" for limited production runs. In other words, Genzyme gets to offer the ability to other companies to manufacture the drug. They maintain their exclusivity since they're still in control of the overall license, they have the ability to revoke sub-licenses or define them in a way such that they expire.
This is one of the biggest complaints some people have with how the patent system works for medicine. It's been reduced to what can make a profit, not what can help make people healthy. In fact, there is zero interest in making people well because then there would be no need to purchase expensive medicines.
While not necessarily a "legal" definition, I think most would agree that failing to product sufficient quantities to prevent patient DEATH (you know - that generally irrevocable event that causes a person to become an ex-person) might qualify as "not enough".
First, I'm an AT&T customer and dislike this new plan just as much as the rest of you. However, I don't think the idea of getting money back for unused bandwidth is going to fly.
Consider non-AT&T cell phone packages (i.e. Verizon) - say a plan that gets you 700 minutes of airtime a month. If you don't use all 700 minutes, do you get money back at the end of the month?
How about a gym membership where you pay a monthly membership (or annual) fee? Do you get money back if you don't go every day?
How about Netflix? Do you get money back if you only rent/stream one movie in an entire month?
It feels good to say "pay me back for what I don't use", but we accept that in many other places so I doubt it will happen here.
... someone set up a "form email submission" site based in a foreign country that would allow you to submit a similar email to Corbin Fisher. I wonder what they'd do with 1000 such emails? Over 9000? Millions? Could make for fun times indeed.
/Something like "click here to send an email confession to Corbin Fisher"
//you could even throw in a spammer-like random return address generator.
By your logic, you should now be in jail, to whit:
Given: Your post copied text from Mike's original work above
Given: IP maximalists love to claim that "fair use" is a defense, not a right.
Given: A defense must be argued in a court of law and cannot be decided by the police or the general public
Given: Copyright infringement and/or inducement is a jailable offense
In any sort of pyramid system, the people that buy in first are the winners and everybody else gets scraps at best. Since the label would know exactly when the album would be made available, they would easily have time to set up the requisite 50+ shell companies to become top level purchasers so that they could recoup as much profit as possible from all sales. If you doubt, take a second to consider "Hollywood accounting" and you'll realize I'm right. Ultimately, the major media companies will never ever play "fair" if there's even a single penny of profit to be made.
This is a big part of what makes me believe that the only "model" that will work is musicians being directly supported by the fans. The major labels will eventually fall to "service for hire" companies:
- Need marketing to go with that new album? Hire UMG with our proven track record of getting your name out there!!!
- Had enough of the local bar scene and think it's time to go on a national tour? Take a look at the Vivendi Total Concert Package deal we've got this month!!!
- Think your bands website needs a little work? Contact the Sony Web Platform team for a free analysis and suggestions on how we can help take it to the next level!!!
These companies have a ton of talent in back office operations which can't be pirated, copied or shared via P2P. Dump the "music as a product" mindset and start selling services already. Heck, if nothing else, the profit margin is far better on services than it is on goods... lol.
Pandora provides a service that is a stream of high and low bits that is utilized by my computer to send an electrical signal to the speakers connected to said computer which in turn use that signal on magnets attached to cones which are vibrated at specific frequencies specified by the signal to recreate sound that approximately matches an original recording made at a point in the past by a musician.
You forgot the very next line from the article which also needs to be considered:
And while copyright law has been pushed and stretched over the years to legally say that such an act is indeed "theft", no right-minded consumer is going to buy into that load of crap. Ever. (bold emphasis mine)
In other words, now that the court case in Canada has been settled, Visa and Mastercard are no longer acceptable forms of payment for any of the compilation albums that were part of the 300,000+ instances of infringement?
Of course, ticket sales dropping would have absolutely nothing to do with the fact that 10 years ago, a family of four could go to the theater for around $35 and now it's closer to $100. Cumulative inflation over the same time (Feb 2001 - Jan 2011) period is around 25%, so movies have gotten progressively more expensive. Add in the increasing quality of home theaters, the increased number of rude people (talking, cell phones, etc), years of mediocre choices (25+ "sequels" due in 2011 alone) and it's no surprise ticket sales have fallen.
The problem with this approach is that the way "most" people get their information on current events is via the same major media pushing for the law. Do you honestly believe that the reporting on the issue to the masses will even be remotely balanced as to the underlying issues?
I see claims of "pirates fighting to kill your jobs", "anti-copyright activists fighting a just law" and "attempts to undermine American intellectual property". Length of copyright - not discussed. Progress - glossed over using specious logic. Fair use - not discussed. Infringement - again, specious logic at best.
While I love the thought, I think your plan has a fatal flaw.
If you've lurked here for a while, you should realize that what many of us have been looking for is better oversight.
The real problem isn't that TSA agents are stealing. That's bound to happen. The problem is that they can get away with it for so long before being caught. There is little to no oversight and a virtually non-existent ability to complain about potential "bad actors" without missing your flight and possibly getting arrested. As scarr mentioned above, bag inspections should be done in front of the passenger. I also think independent evaluation of screening equipment should be performed by disinterested third parties and there needs to be a far better process in place for filing complaints.
I don't think many of us are after disbanding as much as we are after accountability. The "feel safer yet" question could probably be better phrased as "Since the TSA doesn't think they're doing anything wrong and won't allow oversight, do you really feel safer flying than you did before the TSA?"
Funny, but when dealing with hot food for my kids when they were 6-7 years old or younger, I ALWAYS checked it first. It's weird, I know, but for some reason I didn't want them to end up in pain when I could easily check something first.
Obviously, they should have asked for another chair if they knew that one was unstable, but then you would hope the café considers itself responsible for making sure its chairs are safe.
The assumption here is the amount of stability. For an adult (say, a manager of a cafe?), a chair with one leg 1/2" shorter than the others is not wobbly. For a child of 4 that same chair would be, given their still developing muscles and lower threshold of control.
Also, as David pointed out, melted cheese also tends to be somewhat sticky and needs to be heated to greater than 135 degrees for food safety reasons. It could have taken some time for the parents to wipe off the cheese after picking the child up. We've only seen the parents side of the story, so there's also no indication if the wait staff brought out the food and said "careful, the food is hot".
I'm still of the opinion that this is an accident and the parents need to stop trying to collect some cash to ease their guilt over the incident. Accidents happen. Trying to make others pay for them doesn't help you learn to want to prevent them.
On the post: Should A Company Be Liable For What Its Affiliates Do?
Re: This is a problematic area
This gives the company reason to (a) make sure affiliates are real people and not just throw away accounts and (b) make sure the contact info stays up to date so that any liability due to bad faith activities can be applied to the appropriate party.
On the post: Big, Big Loss For Righthaven: Reposting Full Article Found To Be Fair Use
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
The plumbers "creative work" is the creation repair of pipes and plumbing systems. Each job he completes is a "work" much the same that each novel from JRRT was a "work". When the plumber hands the "business down to an heir, the heir MUST continue to create NEW "works" or else the business will fail.
The LotR rights handed down to the heirs are still the original creative "works". The business built around the work is irrelevant (albeit profitable). In the end, JRRT and heirs still only have 4 "works" (Hobbit + 3 LotR books) that they're working with.
To compare back to the plumber, it would be as if the plumber had done all the plumbing work in Empire State Building during construction and for the rest of his life, he was paid a monthly salary. Additionally, for 70 years after his death, that monthly salary passed to his heirs. On top of all that, if anyone wanted to make changes to the plumbing in the building, they would have to license rights to do so from the plumber or his heirs. Still sound fair?
On the post: If Remote DVRs Are Legal... What About Remote DVD Players?
Re: Re: Re:
From my standpoint, I see it as an executive saying "We got at least one person to pay the higher price which means the product should cost the higher price to everyone. Otherwise, we're losing money."
They don't bother to look at a common price vs volume comparison because it's all about maximizing PER UNIT net profit. Most people who have seen consumer behavior in the face of a sale price vs regular priced item understand that you can drastically increase overall net profit by reducing the per item net profit. Entertainment execs don't seem to think that way.
Maybe it's because they don't buy anything on sale or actually go to the stores themselves? Yeah, yeah, that's it... they're too busy scooping up cash for themselves that they don't bother shopping with the unwashed masses... lol.
On the post: If Remote DVRs Are Legal... What About Remote DVD Players?
Re:
It is pure unadulterated greed driven by an irrational fear of their shareholders rather than stepping back and looking at the needs of their customers. Many corporations have fallen into the trap of believing that the shareholders and the company stock price determine the health of the company instead of their products/services and the customers that buy them. I keep hoping they'll wake up, but so far very few have shown signs of stirring.
On the post: Fabry Patients Sue Genzyme Over Drug Shortage; After NIH Refuses To Allow Others To Make Fabrazyme
Re: Re: Re:
Why couldn't Genzyme go back to Mt. Sinai get an expanded license allowing them to "sub-license" for limited production runs. In other words, Genzyme gets to offer the ability to other companies to manufacture the drug. They maintain their exclusivity since they're still in control of the overall license, they have the ability to revoke sub-licenses or define them in a way such that they expire.
This is one of the biggest complaints some people have with how the patent system works for medicine. It's been reduced to what can make a profit, not what can help make people healthy. In fact, there is zero interest in making people well because then there would be no need to purchase expensive medicines.
On the post: Fabry Patients Sue Genzyme Over Drug Shortage; After NIH Refuses To Allow Others To Make Fabrazyme
Re: Re: Re:
On the post: AT&T Jumps Into The Metered Broadband Pool; 150 Gig Limit For DSL
Re: Re: Re: Re: Not going to happen!
Consider non-AT&T cell phone packages (i.e. Verizon) - say a plan that gets you 700 minutes of airtime a month. If you don't use all 700 minutes, do you get money back at the end of the month?
How about a gym membership where you pay a monthly membership (or annual) fee? Do you get money back if you don't go every day?
How about Netflix? Do you get money back if you only rent/stream one movie in an entire month?
It feels good to say "pay me back for what I don't use", but we accept that in many other places so I doubt it will happen here.
On the post: Unicorns And Leprechauns Aren't Real... But Trolls Are (And They Have Lawyers)
Wouldn't it be funny if...
/Something like "click here to send an email confession to Corbin Fisher"
//you could even throw in a spammer-like random return address generator.
On the post: Feds Really Do Seem To Think That Linking To Infringing Content Can Be A Jailable Offense
Re:
Given: Your post copied text from Mike's original work above
Given: IP maximalists love to claim that "fair use" is a defense, not a right.
Given: A defense must be argued in a court of law and cannot be decided by the police or the general public
Given: Copyright infringement and/or inducement is a jailable offense
Result: Off to jail you go... :-)
On the post: Rethinking Music Selling Incentives: Can A Pyramid Scheme Help Save Music Sales?
It would never work...
In any sort of pyramid system, the people that buy in first are the winners and everybody else gets scraps at best. Since the label would know exactly when the album would be made available, they would easily have time to set up the requisite 50+ shell companies to become top level purchasers so that they could recoup as much profit as possible from all sales. If you doubt, take a second to consider "Hollywood accounting" and you'll realize I'm right. Ultimately, the major media companies will never ever play "fair" if there's even a single penny of profit to be made.
This is a big part of what makes me believe that the only "model" that will work is musicians being directly supported by the fans. The major labels will eventually fall to "service for hire" companies:
- Need marketing to go with that new album? Hire UMG with our proven track record of getting your name out there!!!
- Had enough of the local bar scene and think it's time to go on a national tour? Take a look at the Vivendi Total Concert Package deal we've got this month!!!
- Think your bands website needs a little work? Contact the Sony Web Platform team for a free analysis and suggestions on how we can help take it to the next level!!!
These companies have a ton of talent in back office operations which can't be pirated, copied or shared via P2P. Dump the "music as a product" mindset and start selling services already. Heck, if nothing else, the profit margin is far better on services than it is on goods... lol.
On the post: Music Is Not A Product, And You'll Never Adapt If You Think It Is
Re: Re: Re:
Pandora provides a service that is a stream of high and low bits that is utilized by my computer to send an electrical signal to the speakers connected to said computer which in turn use that signal on magnets attached to cones which are vibrated at specific frequencies specified by the signal to recreate sound that approximately matches an original recording made at a point in the past by a musician.
But they do NOT provide music.
On the post: Music Is Not A Product, And You'll Never Adapt If You Think It Is
Re: Do What you Want
And while copyright law has been pushed and stretched over the years to legally say that such an act is indeed "theft", no right-minded consumer is going to buy into that load of crap. Ever. (bold emphasis mine)
On the post: Darrell Issa Tells IP Czar That She's 'Not Trying' If She Can't Pin Liability For File Sharing On Third Parties
Re: Re: Re:
/paytard
On the post: Darrell Issa Tells IP Czar That She's 'Not Trying' If She Can't Pin Liability For File Sharing On Third Parties
Re:
Good to know.
On the post: More Authors Realizing They Can Make A Damn Good Living Self-Releasing Super Cheap eBooks
http://wilwheatonbooks.com/
On the post: Hollywood Gone Mad: Complaining That Oscar Nominated Films Downloaded More
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Can Senator Patrick Leahy Actually Provide The Proof That The COICA Censorship Law Is Needed?
Re: I say we let them have this law ...
I see claims of "pirates fighting to kill your jobs", "anti-copyright activists fighting a just law" and "attempts to undermine American intellectual property". Length of copyright - not discussed. Progress - glossed over using specious logic. Fair use - not discussed. Infringement - again, specious logic at best.
While I love the thought, I think your plan has a fatal flaw.
On the post: TSA Agents Caught Stealing From Passengers & Helping Subordinates Steal As Well
Re: Seriously?
The real problem isn't that TSA agents are stealing. That's bound to happen. The problem is that they can get away with it for so long before being caught. There is little to no oversight and a virtually non-existent ability to complain about potential "bad actors" without missing your flight and possibly getting arrested. As scarr mentioned above, bag inspections should be done in front of the passenger. I also think independent evaluation of screening equipment should be performed by disinterested third parties and there needs to be a far better process in place for filing complaints.
I don't think many of us are after disbanding as much as we are after accountability. The "feel safer yet" question could probably be better phrased as "Since the TSA doesn't think they're doing anything wrong and won't allow oversight, do you really feel safer flying than you did before the TSA?"
On the post: Forget Hot Coffee, Now Disney Is Sued For Severe Burns From Nacho Cheese
Re: Come on People
On the post: Forget Hot Coffee, Now Disney Is Sued For Severe Burns From Nacho Cheese
Re: Re: Picture worth 1000 words...
The assumption here is the amount of stability. For an adult (say, a manager of a cafe?), a chair with one leg 1/2" shorter than the others is not wobbly. For a child of 4 that same chair would be, given their still developing muscles and lower threshold of control.
Also, as David pointed out, melted cheese also tends to be somewhat sticky and needs to be heated to greater than 135 degrees for food safety reasons. It could have taken some time for the parents to wipe off the cheese after picking the child up. We've only seen the parents side of the story, so there's also no indication if the wait staff brought out the food and said "careful, the food is hot".
I'm still of the opinion that this is an accident and the parents need to stop trying to collect some cash to ease their guilt over the incident. Accidents happen. Trying to make others pay for them doesn't help you learn to want to prevent them.
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