Okay, I agree that it's just a mistake on MPAA's part to do this. However, this points to a big problem in the cases: they do NO due diligence on vetting these cases. Filing suit, or even sending a C&D, should not be done without a good faith effort. What we have here is a robot-rubber-stamped process that is spamming the legal system. How is this not a DoS attack on the courts?
I've followed this case a little bit, and it reminds me a bit of the "Wind Done Gone" case.
I have also wondered if various fans could/would basically thumb their noses at the ridiculous contract. If fifty or a thousand fans (or artificial fans) blogged noisily about "the Sequel to Salinger's Catcher in the Rye," what could they possibly do about it? Unsolicited PayPal donations to the author, and underground e-book copies flow both ways across the embargo.
Buying baseball bats is often seen as a proxy for activity in a baseball league, but if the bats are bought by a gang of punks or mobsters, it's best to think about other potential uses for which the bats may be employed.
"These warnings, though, are probably only going to attract more kids to play 'dangerous' 3D games."
Considering the risks are for kids under six years old, I doubt that the warnings will do anything. Six year olds are in first grade schooling, and some of them may have had some previous socializing in daycare and kindergarten. Peer pressure and risk experimentation is nascent and fuzzy at this age. However, virtually none of this age group are aware of news, or of corporate messages like this. Connecting the abstract concept of a negative news story into a risk-reward plan of action is way over a six year old's head. The closest analogy is connecting a blatant and specific imperative command (like those seen in glossy advertising) into an acquisition-bargaining plan of action; e.g., for a McDonald's toy, whine and shriek near mommy's knees.
I have bought both of the Humble Bundles, and also got into the alpha of Minecraft fairly early on. (I also liked the similar MacHeist bundle promotions.)
In part, I love supporting the indie sized projects because I identify with their very personal development stories.
In part, I love supporting the indie sized projects because while the massive multi-million dollar games may be very pretty, they're usually not better games, and they're too big for busy people to really sit down and enjoy in their spare time.
(From Wikipedia: "Development of Final Fantasy VII ... required the efforts of approximately 120 artists and programmers, ... and a budget of more than US$30 million." -- and that's simple compared to today's mega games.)
Machinarium can be played through in about five to six hours, and I played it with my daughter, with the computer wired to the living room television.
Speaking of family play, these games are all DRM free, so I didn't have to do anything special to move them from my personal machine down to the family machine so my daughter could play them from her own account. I just moved the file or folder over the network and voi la.
Braid, Osmos, Aquaria and Machinarium all have great ambient soundtracks (and for one, Machinarium's tracks can be bought separately). Small studio and indie projects often have the best in quirky music -- Katamari Damashii comes to mind.
Once I bought, these two bundles became supported as redeemable tickets on Steam, so I can also request a re-download if I ever need it. But notably, many of the Humble Bundle games are being "bought out" and source code made available to further enrich the community. The "pay what you want" angle is interesting, but that's just scratching the surface of how these bundles are changing the software landscape.
It works fine in preview, but then the text is updated to include the character, not the html-entity notation. I found that out when the "♥" previewed as "♥" and submitted as "♥".
Overheard this: "If the government keeps groping our wives and daughters, somebody is going to go Braveheart on them." Oppressive governments create terrorists, we've been doing it for decades abroad but only in limited numbers domestically.
When will we see some use of the slapp-back provisions of DMCA? The law has penalties for abuse, use them. They're watered down with wiggle room for "good faith" but there are plenty of cases like this one where there's obviously no good faith, just unleashed attack-dog lawyers who need the law explained in the form of penalties.
Bad joke aside, don't conflate the "web" with the "Internet." Gore was speaking of legislation that was related to universities and libraries, which joined other networks like ARPAnet to become an inter-network system. Even Vint Cerf agrees that the legislation was instrumental in expanding the effort to connect disparate components. The "web" was an idea to revamp different kinds of services like gopher and ftp etc. into one user interface that relied on a consistent hypertext formatting.
This is a common over-simplification that annoys me. Depends if you are infringing by not complying with the license terms pursuant to an active copyright or not. All creative works gain copyright protection upon creation; some creators liberally grant duplication permission in their licensing terms; some creators disavow the copyright protection so it enters the public domain.
To add: Trade secrets have very weak protections: once it's out, it's out. Copyright is the current cudgel of choice, and it applies in this case. To "Chronno S. Trigger [sic]" above, if the leaker isn't fined and isn't jailed, what do you suggest should happen, to (1) rectify this case, and (2) disincent others from making similar leaks?
I'm not condoning the over-reaction on the part of this case, but it also looks like this is another techdirt over-reaction. This is a very common set of circumstances, and some of my sympathy goes to the creative staff whose parade was just rained upon.
To draw an analogy, the Japanese market builds up cartoon characters at events as large as the annual Detroit Auto Show. Think of all the secrecy around "mule cars" on unpublicized demonstrations, or of the iPhone 4 debacle. If you're pushing a ton of money into building buzz for a new show, new product or a new story arc of a long-running series, I can see being a bit protective of the trade secret... no mystery buzz, no audience.
Could Microsoft be foolish enough to use this lawsuit as an opportunity to tweak its arch-enemy Google, even though an adverse ruling in this case would almost unquestionably be against Bing's best interests?
Re: If you thought losing Boucher was bad, then gaining lying, ignorant, and incompetent Blumenthal is far worse.
Blumenthal is a rotten, professional camera-kisser. I completely concede that point.
However, in reference to the other poster Dark Helmet above who said that they faced "the proverbial Giant Douche vs. Turd Sandwich across the ticket," I have to say that Connecticut had no choice at all. The World Wrestling Federation's executive spent $50 million dollars to try to buy her seat and overcome her lack of vision.
This time, we collectively voted for the Turd Sandwich. If politics were seen as a form of evolution, we are quickly evolving to the lowest common denominators: idiocy and corruption.
When I was in middle school, there was a filmstrip that explored a group of kids who got into the t-shirt business. It showed all of the usual business startup issues: inventory, capital equipment, investment, wages, etc. Follow-on episodes covered different scenarios, such as where the plucky kids turned a batch of defective shirts into car seat covers.
Hearing of this Planet Money article sent me back to those middle school days. Those movies are one of the many ways I think our schools have lost ground in explaining basic economic and civic theories to this generation.
On the post: MPAA Threatens To Have Google Disconnected From The Internet Over File Sharing?
Re: Re:
On the post: Politician Trespasses Into House Under Construction, Breaks Leg... Sues Owners
Re: Double Standards
On the post: Winner Of $10k From Apple Hung Up, Assuming It Was A Prank Call Or A Sales Call
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: never would've picked up
On the post: Settlement Details On The Banning Of Unauthorized Catcher in The Rye Sequel Even More Troubling
mechanical turk meets streisand?
I have also wondered if various fans could/would basically thumb their noses at the ridiculous contract. If fifty or a thousand fans (or artificial fans) blogged noisily about "the Sequel to Salinger's Catcher in the Rye," what could they possibly do about it? Unsolicited PayPal donations to the author, and underground e-book copies flow both ways across the embargo.
On the post: Why Senator Lieberman's Censorship Law Is Unconstitutional And A Danger To Free Speech
On the post: China's Patent Strategy Isn't About Innovation; It's An Economic Weapon Against Foreign Companies
On the post: DailyDirt: Gaming Can Hurt For Real
Considering the risks are for kids under six years old, I doubt that the warnings will do anything. Six year olds are in first grade schooling, and some of them may have had some previous socializing in daycare and kindergarten. Peer pressure and risk experimentation is nascent and fuzzy at this age. However, virtually none of this age group are aware of news, or of corporate messages like this. Connecting the abstract concept of a negative news story into a risk-reward plan of action is way over a six year old's head. The closest analogy is connecting a blatant and specific imperative command (like those seen in glossy advertising) into an acquisition-bargaining plan of action; e.g., for a McDonald's toy, whine and shriek near mommy's knees.
On the post: Second Humble Indie Bundle Does Even Better Than The First
the product's the thing
In part, I love supporting the indie sized projects because I identify with their very personal development stories.
In part, I love supporting the indie sized projects because while the massive multi-million dollar games may be very pretty, they're usually not better games, and they're too big for busy people to really sit down and enjoy in their spare time.
(From Wikipedia: "Development of Final Fantasy VII ... required the efforts of approximately 120 artists and programmers, ... and a budget of more than US$30 million." -- and that's simple compared to today's mega games.)
Machinarium can be played through in about five to six hours, and I played it with my daughter, with the computer wired to the living room television.
Speaking of family play, these games are all DRM free, so I didn't have to do anything special to move them from my personal machine down to the family machine so my daughter could play them from her own account. I just moved the file or folder over the network and voi la.
Braid, Osmos, Aquaria and Machinarium all have great ambient soundtracks (and for one, Machinarium's tracks can be bought separately). Small studio and indie projects often have the best in quirky music -- Katamari Damashii comes to mind.
Once I bought, these two bundles became supported as redeemable tickets on Steam, so I can also request a re-download if I ever need it. But notably, many of the Humble Bundle games are being "bought out" and source code made available to further enrich the community. The "pay what you want" angle is interesting, but that's just scratching the surface of how these bundles are changing the software landscape.
On the post: Copyheart: Encouraging People To Copy
Re: Re: Oops
On the post: Copyheart: Encouraging People To Copy
On the post: If You Don't Get Every Detail Of Your TSA Detention Exactly Right, The TSA May Publicly Shame You
primae noctis
On the post: Monster Cable Gets Classifieds Search Engine Taken Down With Bogus DMCA Notice
when when when
On the post: 20 Years Ago Today: The Web Was Proposed
Re: Everyone knows it was Al!
On the post: Time To Stop Being So Fascinated With The Cyber- Part Of Cybercrime
Re: Re: say it ain't so!
On the post: Arrested In Japan For Showing People A New Pokemon Character A Few Days Early?
Re:
To add: Trade secrets have very weak protections: once it's out, it's out. Copyright is the current cudgel of choice, and it applies in this case. To "Chronno S. Trigger [sic]" above, if the leaker isn't fined and isn't jailed, what do you suggest should happen, to (1) rectify this case, and (2) disincent others from making similar leaks?
On the post: Arrested In Japan For Showing People A New Pokemon Character A Few Days Early?
To draw an analogy, the Japanese market builds up cartoon characters at events as large as the annual Detroit Auto Show. Think of all the secrecy around "mule cars" on unpublicized demonstrations, or of the iPhone 4 debacle. If you're pushing a ton of money into building buzz for a new show, new product or a new story arc of a long-running series, I can see being a bit protective of the trade secret... no mystery buzz, no audience.
On the post: Nearly Every Company That Hates Google Piles On To Rosetta Stone Case
On the post: One Congressional Loss That Hurts: Rick Boucher
Re: If you thought losing Boucher was bad, then gaining lying, ignorant, and incompetent Blumenthal is far worse.
However, in reference to the other poster Dark Helmet above who said that they faced "the proverbial Giant Douche vs. Turd Sandwich across the ticket," I have to say that Connecticut had no choice at all. The World Wrestling Federation's executive spent $50 million dollars to try to buy her seat and overcome her lack of vision.
This time, we collectively voted for the Turd Sandwich. If politics were seen as a form of evolution, we are quickly evolving to the lowest common denominators: idiocy and corruption.
On the post: Lawyer Sues Facebook Claiming Other Users Defamed Him
Re: Re: Re: "sieze the day"
On the post: Planet Money T-Shirt Plans Include Recognizing That Copying Works For Fashion
Hearing of this Planet Money article sent me back to those middle school days. Those movies are one of the many ways I think our schools have lost ground in explaining basic economic and civic theories to this generation.
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