- Apple sued by The Beatles over iPod, ITMS:
Apparently when Apple Computer first started, The Beatles sued them for the use of the corporate name. In addition to a hefty cash settlement, Apple agreed to only use the corporate name for computer products and not enter the music markeplace.
Years later, The Beatles sued and won another lawsuit when Apple shipped computers that allowed music to be played through attachable speakers. That lawsuit charged breach of a trademark agreement since Apple had agreed to steer clear of the music business. Fox News estimates Apple has paid US$50 million in the lost suits so far.
God damn it’s hard to be an objective 3rd party when happens. I can however, restate the thoughts from my amigo, ehmunro:
“I think this is like the 48th lawsuit they filed. My favourite was the 1980 or so suit where they sued Apple for making a computer capable of reproducing sound — which put them in violation of the Beatles trademark somehow.
Because, how could you possibly tell the difference between a Beatles LP and an Apple ||? I can’t tell you how many times I mixed them up.”
- Should Net surfers be licensed?:
A virus fouls your computer and you haplessly pass it on. Advertising software loads stealthily on your machine. Your password gets stolen because of your neglect. Or the music industry sues you because of something your kids or grandkids did on your computer. Barely a day goes by without someone, somewhere getting stung or stinging others through careless Internet use. Though many of these threats are preventable, relatively few of us take the necessary precautions.So why not institute mandatory education before people can go online? After all, motorists must obtain licenses before they can legally hit the road, and computers are much more complicated.
This whole thing reminds me of the following scene from The Simpsons:
The family is trying to escape some predicament, and are in the car getting ready to roll, but for some reason (I don’t recall why) Homer doesn’t have his driver’s license.
Lisa cries, “Dad! We can’t go–you don’t have your driver’s license.” Homer, dismayed, nonetheless grits his teeth and mutters, “Well, I’m going to try anyway.”
He turns the key, the car starts, and off he goes.
Elated, he cries, “Hey, it worked!”
License schmicense. If surfing the net is outlawed, only outlaws will surf the net.
- Torvalds to SCO: Negotiate what?:
Linux creator says there is no proof of copyright infringement
In a letter dated Tuesday, the maintainer of the Linux kernel dismissed an offer from SCO Chief Executive Officer Darl McBride to negotiate the dispute with the open-source community. “There doesn’t seem to be anything to negotiate about. SCO has yet to show any infringing IP (intellectual property) in the open-source domain,” Torvalds wrote.
Torvalds also had a few sarcastic words for the Lindon, Utah-based SCO, noting that it is ironic that SCO acquired much of its capital from an initial public offering based on a Linux business model. “We have to sadly decline taking business model advice from a company that seems to have squandered all of its money … and now seems to play the U.S. legal system like a lottery,” he wrote.
Hey, but uhh, my equally ambiguous claim to own all code in both Tetris and Asteroids is legitimate! I’m going to send a letter out to everyone using the software and charge $699 per processor or can of TaB, whichever there are more of.
- Guidelines for submission of resumes to Damage Studios:
Please send all resumes in text or pdf format. We do not open word documents sent from outside the company. We will immediately delete them, and the mail they came attached to, if received. Any resumes which include the SCO Group after September of 2003 will be immediately deleted as well.
Collectrix.com, BlogPromotion.com and HeroicDesigns.com have also started a similar policy. Of course we only hire Chinese and Indians in China and India, so it wouldn’t have mattered anyways…
And I haven’t posted a picture for way too long, so here is one in rememberance of jobs, employment and things we wished we had:
- BigChampagne is Watching You:
In fact, they’re tracking every download and selling the data to the music industry. How one company is turning file-sharing networks into the world’s biggest focus group.
[...]
According to on-the-record statements by many major labels, the scene I witnessed in Fleischer’s office couldn’t possibly have happened. But Eric Garland, CEO of BigChampagne, says his firm is working with Maverick, Atlantic, Warner Bros., Interscope, DreamWorks, Elektra, and Disney’s Hollywood label. The labels are reticent to admit their relationship with BigChampagne for public relations reasons, but there’s a legal rationale, too. The record industry’s lawsuits against file-sharing companies hang on their assertion that the programs have no use other than to help infringe copyrights. If the labels acknowledge a legitimate use for P2P programs, it would undercut their case as well as their zero-tolerance stance. “We would definitely consider gleaning marketing wisdom from these networks a non-infringing use,” says Fred von Lohmann, staff counsel for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the San Francisco-based cyber liberties group that’s helping to defend Morpheus, Grokster, and Kazaa.
[...]
“The fact is, P2P is a likely distribution channel for our wares,” says Jed Simon, head of new media for DreamWorks Records. “If we’re going to be intelligent businesspeople, it behooves us to understand it.” BigChampagne is happy to provide that understanding, even if it has to operate on the sly. (via Jim)
Blasphemous! Are you suggesting that users of P2P programs might download songs they either like or are interested in? And in turn, the record companies and radio stations analyze the data compiled from P2P software and find trends?
double standard
n.
A set of principles permitting greater opportunity or liberty to one than to another, especially the granting of greater sexual freedom to men than to women.
[...]
3. Divided into two; acting two parts, one openly and the other secretly; equivocal; deceitful; insincere.
Oh, and doesn’t the guy (in the picture) on the right look like Will, from Will & Grace?
- Music Wars:
Friday, September 12, on TechTV we’re devoting two and a half hours to the music industry and file sharing. The special, called Music Wars, will begin after the Screen Savers at 8p Eastern with an hour long documentary on the RIAA, record companies, and file sharing, and then Michaela and I will host a live ninety minute Town Hall from 9-10:30p Eastern featuring your calls plus guests from the RIAA, EFF, record labels, recording artists, ethicists, and real people who are being sued, who download music, and who refuse to download music. (Thanks Jim)
Too little, too late? Or, better late than never?
- Cult! Fear and loathing in College Station:
I tried to escape. Honest, I did. But believe me when I tell you, I didn’t know what the hell was going on. What was happening around me was dumbfounding, disturbing, frightening.
[...]
This was called “The Yell,” and I found myself unwittingly and unintentionally thrown into the middle of it. It was there that I began to discover just what College Station, Texas was all about-and I’m not exaggerating when I say it may have changed my life forever. (via David)
It might be news to someone from Utah (speaking of cults, I’ve heard about these Mormon guys…), but it’s really not a “huge” deal. The way I explain football to outsiders is this: Football is the Father, the Band is the Holy Spirit, Yell Leaders are Jesus, Jebus, Cheesus, etc. And the student body is that cracker you eat during communion.
See, not very complex or confusing. Oh and: Sit down, bus driver!
- Fame vs Fortune: Micropayments and Free Content:
Why Micropayment Systems Don’t Work
The people pushing micropayments believe that the dollar cost of goods is the thing most responsible for deflecting readers from buying content, and that a reduction in price to micropayment levels will allow creators to begin charging for their work without deflecting readers.
This strategy doesn’t work, because the act of buying anything, even if the price is very small, creates what Nick Szabo calls mental transaction costs, the energy required to decide whether something is worth buying or not, regardless of price. The only business model that delivers money from sender to receiver with no mental transaction costs is theft, and in many ways, theft is the unspoken inspiration for micropayment systems.
Anyone ever use the “micro” systems at PayPalSucks.com? I need reviews people, get to work.
- Valve lets off steam over NVIDIA performance:
Greetings from ATI’s “Shader Days” event, where, in a remarkable presentation, Gabe Newell of Valve, famed developers of the Half-Life series, just uncorked a shocking set of benchmarks of his company’s new DirectX 9 game. Newell also expressed his frustation at some graphics hardware makers’ attempts to influence the outcome of benchmarks using driver-based optimizations.
[...]
As you can tell from looking at the list in the slide above, Newell was concerned particularly with some of the techniques NVIDIA has used in recent driver releases, although he didn’t exempt other graphics hardware makers from his complaints. He said they had seen cases where fog was completely removed from a level in one of Valve’s games, by the graphics driver software, in order to improve performance. I asked him to clarify which game, and he said it was Half-Life 2. Apparently, this activity has gone on while the game is still in development. He also mentioned that he’s seen drivers detect screen capture attempts and output higher quality data than what’s actually shown in-game.
I’ve read several overviews in the past couple of days as to why the ATi cards rock nVidia’s world. It basically boils down to ATi following the referrence model Microsoft provided, which the makers of the LeForce did not. Now, one of the arguments that I’ve seen is that nVidia’s cards are great if a developer properly optimizes the game and/or nVidia optimizes their drivers. Of course, you could always do it the easy way, and just do what ATi did and RTFM.
And this is what Gabe at Valve pointed out, stating in part that because Valve has the resources in terms of capital and hu-mans, they were able to hammer out kinks and hacks for the nVidia-specific pathways — and smaller studios would be unable to do the same thing.
My personal thoughts on the matter: just like the enthusiast consumer market bitched at ATi throughout the late ’90s and even up through last year regarding drivers, they should moan and groan (justifiably so) at nVidia. ATi shaped up quite a bit, in part from the outcry of these consumers. Hopefully instead of ignoring both developers and end-users, nVidia will also do the same: improve and innovate.
- Industry Group Pays Child’s RIAA Fine:
Pick pirates more carefully, peer-to-peer organization tells music labels.
P2P United, a newly formed industry trade association, says it will pay the $2000 fine imposed on 12-year-old Brianna LaHara by the recording industry for illegally downloading music from the Internet. The fine was the result of a settlement reached Tuesday between the Recording Industry Association of America and the girl’s single mother.
I mentioned two days ago that the president of Grokster was willing to foot-the-bill in this shameless case (is there ever a shameful?). Hopefully the P2PUnited trade group can add be a constant thorn to the RIAA.
Special note: head on over to Suprnova.tk, goto the Movies section then Other. Grab the “RIAA Public Service Announcement” (PSA) — it’s fantastica (you need Bit Torrent to download it). Or you can try this mirror (I don’t know how long it will be up).
