Understood, and I agreed with your original point while I was writing the response. This person, and those in power who think like him, are most definitely not idiots. They know exactly what they're doing and why they're doing it. They are opportunists by any definition of the word. They're fully aware of what they're saying.
A law enforcement official pushing to expand his powers after a shocking crime is about as "idiotic" as a guy going to his boss for a raise when whatever he's working on succeeds fantastically.
An expansion of law enforcement powers almost always comes at the expense of the rights of the citizenry. Getting a raise from your boss doesn't necessarily mean your taking money away from your coworkers.
One question, though, Stewart, tied into Boston Marathon as you've done with yours: all of this surveillance, all these increased security measures, all this warrantless wiretapping, all these pat downs and scans at the airport, all of these drones flying all over the world, all these double-secret interpretations of super-secret laws, all of these redacted FOIA responses, all of this Cyber Pearl Harbor hand wringing, all of encroachment of the government into every aspect of American existence?
It's not funny that in actuality, they do have unlimited power, via the tens of millions of voters who don't give a flying fuck about holding their elected officials accountable.
There's not one single elected official in Washington who's scared of being voted out. With a incumbency rate of over 90% for Congress, an elected official has virtual carte blanche to do whatever the hell they want. They only fear the electorate when it's motivated behind a single common purpose - see the SOPA/PIPA protests. Oh sure, they started jumping off that sinking ship on global protest day, but I didn't see many disavowing that legislation before then.
It's not until we turn the lights on that the roaches will scramble. Until then, politicians DO have unlimited power, by our inaction.
You know, at this point, the only real hope I have for the future is that these "good ol' days" will be remembered via a really cool Billy-Joel-esque "We Didn't Start the Fire" song in 2045.
I'm not worried about that crap. I just found out that my body is swimming in something called deoxyribonucleic acid. ACID! Like, that metal-eating slobber that that alien thing leaves all over the place. If it can eat thru a metal floor, imagine what it's doing to my body! Yuck!
The clearinghouse "doesn't necessarily prevent trademark infringement or cybersquatting, but it does help trademark owners and brand owners somewhat in mitigating the damage that might occur," he added. "We've been telling brand owners it's not that expensive to protect themselves and they ought to do it."
That's a real nice looking trademark you got there. It'd a shame if something were to happen to it....
I'll give EA a calculable, quantifiable loss right now:
I love the SimCity franchise. I wanted to buy SC2013. Then you revealed an unnecessary always-online requirement. Afterwards, I did not want to buy SC2013, so I did not and will not.
There's a verifiable lost sale you can stick in your spreadsheet.
1. Hacker takes over Computer A
2. Hacker uses Computer A to hack into Computer B
3. User of Computer B notices hack attempt from Computer A
4. User B installs covert software to snap a pic from the webcam of Computer A to catch evil hacker
5. User A happens to be a teenage girl who's changing clothes at the time.
6. User B gets 50 years in PMITA prison for child porn.
7. Lawmakers pat themselves on the back for catching dangerous predator of America's youth.
8. Lawmakers continue to propose stupid laws. Americans continue to elect stupid lawmakers.
I actually don't mind this statement from Maxis. If they decide they want a game to function in a certain manner, then fine - let the consumers decide if the benefits of said function outweigh the negatives. Maxis has a right to design the game the way they see fit, and if it fails spectacularly, then they can go back to the drawing board and say "OK, that sucked. Let's not do that again"
However, this would've been a better statement to make BEFORE all this crap went down. They've already been busted lying their asses off about the mandatory-online feature. They said it was essential to basic gameplay - LIARS! They're reeling from the massive amount of negative feedback from a launch so frakked up that they got a Hallmark card from the Soviet space program. This statement is the equivalent of sour grapes - nobody believes our lies anymore, so we'll just rationalize the whole thing away, with an emphatic "End of Story!" at the end.
If they'd come out and said, well before release, that they wanted SimCity to be online-always because they wanted to move the franchise in a more social multiplayer direction, then fine. This move reeked of DRM from the start, and every day something new pops up that confirms that. EA can no longer deny it anymore, so they make hindsight justifications for it.
A) 400 metric tons of federal laws, most of which are written so vaguely that they could be interpreted to criminalize improperly washing your hands after taking a leak.
B) Businesses that are petrified of being sued out of existence that they'll write policies that have less give than a titanium mattress.
C) Employees that are petrified of being fired for showing the most minute sense of "oh, come the fuck on! It's a picture of a backseat television! I seriously doubt he gonna single-handedly commandeer the plane and crash us into the Golden Gate Bridge" that they'd rather just keep their head down and not get themselves in trouble. After all, what does it matter to the pilot if the guy gets tossed off the plane?
Re: Quite a stretch, Mike. -- But pleasant fantasy!
As the hippies would say, "Go to bed, old man!"
Your arguments could be extended to any invention over the past 400 years to paint them as somehow "evil" inventions.
Airplanes allow drug smugglers to bring in their toxic cargo, and terrorists to take hostages and crash into buildings. Thanks a lot, Orville and Wibur!
Cars kill thousands on the road every year. Thanks a lot, Daimler Motor Car Company!
Railroads allowed a-holes like Cornelius Vanderbuilt and Jay Gould to become obscenely wealthy. Thanks a lot, James Watt!
Three easy examples. Three developments that revolutionized not just the country, but the entire world, and provided incalculable benefit to humankind. Did they produce some bad apples? Yeah - our inventions are merely tools conjured from our imagination and utilized by our flawed souls. They have every bit the capability of evil and good as their human operator. No more, no less. There is no such thing as "bad" innovation. Those who look at change as a threat to their livelihood are both shortsighted and underestimate their own abilities to adapt and change.
That's the kind of "innovation" that I think is good? Frak yeah. Innovation grows us as a species. It actively repels stagnation. It drives cultural and physiological changes and in more cases than not, increases prosperity across the entire planet. Innovation begets change, which begets more innovation. Stagnation begets complacency, which will beget extinction.
To quote Robert Heinlein:
Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded — here and there, now and then — are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.
This is known as "bad luck."
If he'd been the mayor of a major US city, he could've been convicted for running a bribery and extortion ring out of the mayor's office and only gotten 20 years.
I kinda feel sorry for the players, but at the same time, I was LMAO at the reports coming in on PC Gamer and Kotaku. I (and probably everybody else here) saw this fiasco coming from 20 miles away. And the sucky thing about it is that it's not going to deter one frakking company from doing anything differently.
EA is not going to say "hey, we may have made a big mistake making this online only." No, they're sitting in their boardrooms RIGHT NOW saying "We need more hardware to handle the load." Their fundamental grasp on reality has slipped away. They're going gung-ho to treat a symptom with zero thought as to what the underlying cause of it is.
And nothing will change because of it. Millions of people will still buy Diablo 4, forgetting (or ignoring) the infamous day that Diablo 3 came out.
Eliminating piracy at the expense of pissing off your customers? At EA, absolutely. After all, the majority of their customers already hate them.
On the post: NY Police Chief Ray Kelly Says The Boston Bombing Takes Privacy 'Off The Table'
Re: Re: Re: Re:
On the post: NY Police Chief Ray Kelly Says The Boston Bombing Takes Privacy 'Off The Table'
Re: Re:
An expansion of law enforcement powers almost always comes at the expense of the rights of the citizenry. Getting a raise from your boss doesn't necessarily mean your taking money away from your coworkers.
On the post: Former DHS Official Says Boston Bombing Proves ACLU & EFF Are Wrong About Surveillance And CISPA
What did it prevent?
I'm sorry, but that's classified.
On the post: Sen. Feinstein Says Congress 'Ready To Take Action' To Rein In Violent Video Games
Re:
There's not one single elected official in Washington who's scared of being voted out. With a incumbency rate of over 90% for Congress, an elected official has virtual carte blanche to do whatever the hell they want. They only fear the electorate when it's motivated behind a single common purpose - see the SOPA/PIPA protests. Oh sure, they started jumping off that sinking ship on global protest day, but I didn't see many disavowing that legislation before then.
It's not until we turn the lights on that the roaches will scramble. Until then, politicians DO have unlimited power, by our inaction.
On the post: Sen. Feinstein Says Congress 'Ready To Take Action' To Rein In Violent Video Games
*facepalm*
On the post: DJs' 'Dihydrogen Monoxide' April Fool's Prank Results In Suspension And Possible Felony Charges
Re:
Lawsuit against Monsanto in 3.....2.....1....
On the post: DJs' 'Dihydrogen Monoxide' April Fool's Prank Results In Suspension And Possible Felony Charges
Re: The next threat...
On the post: ICANN's New Trademark 'Clearinghouse' Resembles Mobsters' 'Insurance' Program
That's a real nice looking trademark you got there. It'd a shame if something were to happen to it....
On the post: Super Meat Boy Developer To EA: DRM Hurts Your Bottom Line More Than Piracy Does
I love the SimCity franchise. I wanted to buy SC2013. Then you revealed an unnecessary always-online requirement. Afterwards, I did not want to buy SC2013, so I did not and will not.
There's a verifiable lost sale you can stick in your spreadsheet.
On the post: Rep. Gohmert Wants A Law That Allows Victims To Destroy The Computers Of People Who Hacked Them
2. Hacker uses Computer A to hack into Computer B
3. User of Computer B notices hack attempt from Computer A
4. User B installs covert software to snap a pic from the webcam of Computer A to catch evil hacker
5. User A happens to be a teenage girl who's changing clothes at the time.
6. User B gets 50 years in PMITA prison for child porn.
7. Lawmakers pat themselves on the back for catching dangerous predator of America's youth.
8. Lawmakers continue to propose stupid laws. Americans continue to elect stupid lawmakers.
On the post: Maxis GM: Our Vision Is More Important Than Our Customers & Lots Of People Love Our Crappy DRM
However, this would've been a better statement to make BEFORE all this crap went down. They've already been busted lying their asses off about the mandatory-online feature. They said it was essential to basic gameplay - LIARS! They're reeling from the massive amount of negative feedback from a launch so frakked up that they got a Hallmark card from the Soviet space program. This statement is the equivalent of sour grapes - nobody believes our lies anymore, so we'll just rationalize the whole thing away, with an emphatic "End of Story!" at the end.
If they'd come out and said, well before release, that they wanted SimCity to be online-always because they wanted to move the franchise in a more social multiplayer direction, then fine. This move reeked of DRM from the start, and every day something new pops up that confirms that. EA can no longer deny it anymore, so they make hindsight justifications for it.
On the post: United Airlines Kicks Travel Writer Off Of Plane For Photographing His Seat
A) 400 metric tons of federal laws, most of which are written so vaguely that they could be interpreted to criminalize improperly washing your hands after taking a leak.
B) Businesses that are petrified of being sued out of existence that they'll write policies that have less give than a titanium mattress.
C) Employees that are petrified of being fired for showing the most minute sense of "oh, come the fuck on! It's a picture of a backseat television! I seriously doubt he gonna single-handedly commandeer the plane and crash us into the Golden Gate Bridge" that they'd rather just keep their head down and not get themselves in trouble. After all, what does it matter to the pilot if the guy gets tossed off the plane?
On the post: Iran Wants To Sue Hollywood Over Argo Somewhere, Some Time, & For Some Reason
All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
See? Coincidence!
On the post: Nielsen Finally Realizes That TV Viewers Are Cord Cutting, Calls It 'Interesting Consumer Behavior'
That's really the *only* programming I'm unwilling to give up.
On the post: Innovators Break Stuff, Including The Rules: How Gates, Jobs & Zuckerberg Could Have Been Targeted Like Aaron Swartz
Re: Quite a stretch, Mike. -- But pleasant fantasy!
Your arguments could be extended to any invention over the past 400 years to paint them as somehow "evil" inventions.
Airplanes allow drug smugglers to bring in their toxic cargo, and terrorists to take hostages and crash into buildings. Thanks a lot, Orville and Wibur!
Cars kill thousands on the road every year. Thanks a lot, Daimler Motor Car Company!
Railroads allowed a-holes like Cornelius Vanderbuilt and Jay Gould to become obscenely wealthy. Thanks a lot, James Watt!
Three easy examples. Three developments that revolutionized not just the country, but the entire world, and provided incalculable benefit to humankind. Did they produce some bad apples? Yeah - our inventions are merely tools conjured from our imagination and utilized by our flawed souls. They have every bit the capability of evil and good as their human operator. No more, no less. There is no such thing as "bad" innovation. Those who look at change as a threat to their livelihood are both shortsighted and underestimate their own abilities to adapt and change.
That's the kind of "innovation" that I think is good? Frak yeah. Innovation grows us as a species. It actively repels stagnation. It drives cultural and physiological changes and in more cases than not, increases prosperity across the entire planet. Innovation begets change, which begets more innovation. Stagnation begets complacency, which will beget extinction.
To quote Robert Heinlein:
Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded — here and there, now and then — are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty.
This is known as "bad luck."
On the post: Innovators Break Stuff, Including The Rules: How Gates, Jobs & Zuckerberg Could Have Been Targeted Like Aaron Swartz
wrong profession
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/03/11/verdict-detroit-ex-mayor/1978229/
On the post: Our Turn To Get Bizarre Legal Threats From Global Wildlife Foundation
Re:
http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lksjqqRa5N1qihssro1_250.jpg
On the post: Launch Day Punishment: SimCity's Online-Only DRM Locking Purchasers Out Of Servers, Purchases
EA is not going to say "hey, we may have made a big mistake making this online only." No, they're sitting in their boardrooms RIGHT NOW saying "We need more hardware to handle the load." Their fundamental grasp on reality has slipped away. They're going gung-ho to treat a symptom with zero thought as to what the underlying cause of it is.
And nothing will change because of it. Millions of people will still buy Diablo 4, forgetting (or ignoring) the infamous day that Diablo 3 came out.
Eliminating piracy at the expense of pissing off your customers? At EA, absolutely. After all, the majority of their customers already hate them.
On the post: Bizarre Legal Threat Of The Day: Confused Zoo Owner Threatens Popehat Over... Well... Just Read It
Boy, they've got an algorithm to calculate everything, don't they?
On the post: The Worst Article You Might Ever Read About 'Cybersecurity'
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