The costs of data retention is very high. The US is talking about two-year retention, which would be insanely expensive. Encrypting would be a bit of an extra burden, but relatively small in comparison.
Cost is the main reason ISP's cite when they oppose data retention laws. ISP's might look at this as a protest method. The government might back off if they realized that the logs were going to be useless to them except in extreme cases when they get the NSA involved.
Let's face it, the MPAA is probably the one pushing the retention to make it easier to sift through the ISP logs and catch file sharers en mass. Even a puny 128 bit ISP encryption system would throw a giant monkey wrench into those plans.
There are lots of problems with the data, but those problems don't mask what I think is the big reveal from the charts.
Looking at the original article one thing that strikes me is that all of the Canadian suppliers except one are significantly higher than the all of the US providers, and the lowest Canadian speed is right up there with the top tier of American suppliers.
This shows how poor competition is in the US. US providers often say that US service is slower than other countries because we have low population densities. Well, Canada is even has even lower population density than the US, even if you only consider limit the calculations to 200 miles of Canada's southern border.
>>Only detonate when a properly formed SMS is sent... ie a passcode trigger sent via SMS...
Their method is usually much cruder than this. What they used to do was just open the phone and wire across the speaker terminals. When the phone rings, the bomb goes off. I am guessing they are not much more sophisticated than that now. They are probably using cheap phones that can be purchased anywhere; they are not likely to be using an iPhone or other sophisticated smart phone.
You haven't factored in the insurance company's role
This comes from my own family's experience.
The other parties involved here are the insurance companies for the builder and the owners. In practice, it is the insurance companies who decide how far this goes, and they are likely to want an out of court settlement on the outside chance that they could get hit by a large settlement. So the process will be that they first settle on the amount of damage that would be due if the builder and homeowner were in fact liable. Let's say they decide that it is $250,000. Then they will sit down and figure out what percentage is the fault of the plaintiff. This percentage will be a maximum of 90%. Since the door was unlocked, it could be lower. So, in the worse case scenario the plaintiff walks away with $25,000 minus 40% for attorney fees. It's a sweet deal for the plaintiff and an even sweeter deal for the attorney who does not have to suffer through a broken leg. It also explains why we have so many of these types of lawsuits.
I think you have pretty well summarized the last five years of TD in one post. Everything you are saying sounds pretty obvious to most people outside the recording industry. Industry executives and their paid operatives don't seem to get it however. As Upton Sinclair said, "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!"
It wasn't that long ago that cell phones were the targets of the neo-Luddites. Politicians and pundits were stumbling all over themselves trying to come up with laws to keep the snobby cell phone users on a short leash.
Once the politicians and pundits discovered how useful cell phones were and started using the evil devices themselves, the paranoia shifted to text messaging. I think that is even dying down after texting demonstrated its usefulness during the last election. Heck, I saw the same thing happen in my family during a two-week period when one person went from complaining about the nieces and nephews texting to saying she needed to get a new phone because her old one was too small and made her thumbs cramp up.
I am reminded of a letter a old lady sent to Wernher von Braun that said something like "Why do we have to go to the moon. Why can't we just stay home and watch television the way God intended." The pattern of fearing new technology before embracing it as normal is nothing new, and it will probably be with us for a long time.
I agree that a scale would be nice, but it looks like the rate at the end of the period is still higher than his former sales. The graph is for a very short period, but it does look like this isn't a one-time boost. There may have been a bigger boost when the piracy started, but at least some of the sales increase appears to be permanent.
The brains of most top executives are not wired to think like this. For the last generation the have let the lawyers and accountants run their businesses for them. The corporate instinct is now to try to control everything and maximize quarterly profits. Concepts like forward thinking, common sense, and civic responsibility have been bred out of the modern boardroom. Twenty years ago this problem would have been turned over to the Public Relations department and let them try to spin it to a positive angle. Now the instinct is to kill the messenger.
It seems to me that very few people actually like Facebook. We love having a place where we can communicate with friends, but we hate Facebook itself. The phenomenon speaks to the power of building a community. People keep coming back to the Facebook community even though the Facebook company makes everyone angry on a regular basis.
This isn't about piracy. It is about creating art. Artists build on the works of others, adding their own style. Someday someone will use their work for inspiration. And the cycle continues.
I think Internet Explorer is a classic example of the need for competition. IE improved steadily when Netscape was still around. Once Netscape was vanquished there was no effective competition, and IE stagnated. IE didn't really start growing again until Firefox came along. Suddenly IE got tabbed browsing, spell checking, and a lot of the other features that were attracting people to the competition.
It's not really about whether this is a public or private place. The question is did she have a reasonable expectation of privacy. Pretty clearly you don't have much expectation of privacy in a mall.
I saw an interview with the woman and her attorney. The attorney said they were trying to decide who is to blame for the fall. It seems to me that it is a pretty short list, starting with his client. It does look like a higher railing might have prevented her from toppling over, but texting while walking looks like the main reason for the fall.
I saw an interview with the woman and her attorney. The attorney said they were trying to decide who is to blame for the fall. It seems to me that it is a pretty short list, starting with his client. It does look like a higher railing might have prevented her from toppling over, texting while walking looks like the main reason for the fall.
My kids got me a 1-year subscription to Netflix. Before that I rarely watched movies.
As it currently stands, the selection for streaming is barely adequate to keep my interest. If things stay as they are I will probably renew on my own when the subscription runs out. However, if the price goes up or the selection drops then I won't. renew.
One alternative to high-priced movies is to not watch them at all. Netflix changed me from a non-movie consumer into at least a small revenue stream. I suspect there are a lot more people like me who will pay something to be able to watch movies, but won't pay exorbitant amounts.
The movie industry has fallen into the trap of thinking that everyone is willing to pay them a lot of money for their product. I don't think that they are capable of understanding that not everyone wants to pay them a lot of money. They don't seem to grasp the fact that some people will just ignore their product because the price is too high. Consumers also don't care what studio produces their movies, and they don't want to have to subscribe to several different services to get a selection of movies. Netflix does understand this. Netflix is based on getting modest payments from a lot of people who send them money every month. As long as Netflix can keep its customers, it will keep sending checks to the studios.
I think that the studios will kill the goose that is laying golden eggs for them. I expect that I won't have to decide what to do when my annual subscription to Netflix runs out. I think the studios will have managed to effectively kill it off by then and deny themselves a revenue stream. And all the studio execs will congratulate themselves and get large bonuses for doing it.
On the post: Swedish ISP Will Automatically Encrypt All Traffic To Protect Privacy Under New Data Retention Laws
Re:
Cost is the main reason ISP's cite when they oppose data retention laws. ISP's might look at this as a protest method. The government might back off if they realized that the logs were going to be useless to them except in extreme cases when they get the NSA involved.
Let's face it, the MPAA is probably the one pushing the retention to make it easier to sift through the ISP logs and catch file sharers en mass. Even a puny 128 bit ISP encryption system would throw a giant monkey wrench into those plans.
On the post: Netflix Shows Which ISPs Actually Perform Well... And Which Don't
Canadians
Looking at the original article one thing that strikes me is that all of the Canadian suppliers except one are significantly higher than the all of the US providers, and the lowest Canadian speed is right up there with the top tier of American suppliers.
This shows how poor competition is in the US. US providers often say that US service is slower than other countries because we have low population densities. Well, Canada is even has even lower population density than the US, even if you only consider limit the calculations to 200 miles of Canada's southern border.
On the post: Unexpected New Years SMS From Mobile Operator May Have Killed Would Be Suicide Bomber
Re: A smarter way to use SMS
Their method is usually much cruder than this. What they used to do was just open the phone and wire across the speaker terminals. When the phone rings, the bomb goes off. I am guessing they are not much more sophisticated than that now. They are probably using cheap phones that can be purchased anywhere; they are not likely to be using an iPhone or other sophisticated smart phone.
On the post: Unexpected New Years SMS From Mobile Operator May Have Killed Would Be Suicide Bomber
Add to checklist
___ Leave phone turned off until bomb is in place.
On the post: Politician Trespasses Into House Under Construction, Breaks Leg... Sues Owners
You haven't factored in the insurance company's role
The other parties involved here are the insurance companies for the builder and the owners. In practice, it is the insurance companies who decide how far this goes, and they are likely to want an out of court settlement on the outside chance that they could get hit by a large settlement. So the process will be that they first settle on the amount of damage that would be due if the builder and homeowner were in fact liable. Let's say they decide that it is $250,000. Then they will sit down and figure out what percentage is the fault of the plaintiff. This percentage will be a maximum of 90%. Since the door was unlocked, it could be lower. So, in the worse case scenario the plaintiff walks away with $25,000 minus 40% for attorney fees. It's a sweet deal for the plaintiff and an even sweeter deal for the attorney who does not have to suffer through a broken leg. It also explains why we have so many of these types of lawsuits.
On the post: Musical Chairs At The Major Record Labels
Re: Perhaps late to the party
On the post: Musical Chairs At The Major Record Labels
Deck Chairs
On the post: The Latest Generation Of 'Get Off My Lawn!' Books From People Who Don't Understand Technology
Remember when?
Once the politicians and pundits discovered how useful cell phones were and started using the evil devices themselves, the paranoia shifted to text messaging. I think that is even dying down after texting demonstrated its usefulness during the last election. Heck, I saw the same thing happen in my family during a two-week period when one person went from complaining about the nieces and nephews texting to saying she needed to get a new phone because her old one was too small and made her thumbs cramp up.
I am reminded of a letter a old lady sent to Wernher von Braun that said something like "Why do we have to go to the moon. Why can't we just stay home and watch television the way God intended." The pattern of fearing new technology before embracing it as normal is nothing new, and it will probably be with us for a long time.
On the post: Taking The Long View: App Developer Happy That Piracy Doubled His Sales
Re:
On the post: Why Would The NFL Force Toyota To Pull An Ad About Protecting Players From Concussions?
Re: NFL Concussion Injury coverup contiues.
On the post: Scammers Move In: Facebook Getting Sketchy
Does anyone actually like Facebook?
On the post: Francis Ford Coppola On Art, Copying And File Sharing: We Want You To Take From Us
Re: pirate's now, revolutionaries later
On the post: After Failed Lawsuit Against 'Copying Competitor' CEO Admits That The Competition Made Her Company Better
IE
On the post: Google Effectively Puts Demand Media On Notice Days Before Planned IPO
On the post: Woman Threatening To Sue Mall Because Mall Video Captured Her Text-And-Walking Into A Fountain
Re: Re: Re:
On the post: Woman Threatening To Sue Mall Because Mall Video Captured Her Text-And-Walking Into A Fountain
Re: Who to blame
On the post: Woman Threatening To Sue Mall Because Mall Video Captured Her Text-And-Walking Into A Fountain
Who to blame
On the post: Woman Threatening To Sue Mall Because Mall Video Captured Her Text-And-Walking Into A Fountain
Who to blame
On the post: Letting Famous People Interact Online? Patented! Twitter Sued
It's a good thing this was patented
/sarcasm
On the post: Will Hollywood Kill The Golden Goose By Squeezing Netflix Dry?
New to Netflix
As it currently stands, the selection for streaming is barely adequate to keep my interest. If things stay as they are I will probably renew on my own when the subscription runs out. However, if the price goes up or the selection drops then I won't. renew.
One alternative to high-priced movies is to not watch them at all. Netflix changed me from a non-movie consumer into at least a small revenue stream. I suspect there are a lot more people like me who will pay something to be able to watch movies, but won't pay exorbitant amounts.
The movie industry has fallen into the trap of thinking that everyone is willing to pay them a lot of money for their product. I don't think that they are capable of understanding that not everyone wants to pay them a lot of money. They don't seem to grasp the fact that some people will just ignore their product because the price is too high. Consumers also don't care what studio produces their movies, and they don't want to have to subscribe to several different services to get a selection of movies. Netflix does understand this. Netflix is based on getting modest payments from a lot of people who send them money every month. As long as Netflix can keep its customers, it will keep sending checks to the studios.
I think that the studios will kill the goose that is laying golden eggs for them. I expect that I won't have to decide what to do when my annual subscription to Netflix runs out. I think the studios will have managed to effectively kill it off by then and deny themselves a revenue stream. And all the studio execs will congratulate themselves and get large bonuses for doing it.
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