146 karma · joined December 22, 2009
Mid-bubble, I can't count how many people told me that the market can only go up, or who looked at me like I was insane when I said I was watching month-over-month sales to try to avoid getting creamed when the bubble inevitably burst.
That said, an IP market doesn't need perfect government protection to survive. It just needs to be good enough that those who wish to steal additional copies incur substantive risk and/or cost.
I'm not arguing it's the best or only way to proceed, simply that it is a possible and seemingly viable way to do so, and as such, people would do well to recognize that the future is not guaranteed to be copyright and patent-free.
Perhaps the government will simply increase the costs and risks associated with breaking that law until they are so extreme, and the risk of getting caught so high, that large-scale piracy will cease to be a worthwhile endeavor.
I know that HN is fond of the view that IP will be abandoned, but I see no compelling reason to believe your vision is more likely than mine.
I'm a fan of creating artificial scarcity, if it is what the seller prefers. I'm disturbed by the number of Hackers who would prefer to strip individuals of their rights to do business as they please, selling products on their on terms.
The marginal costs couldn't be more irrelevant to the discussion.
They sound great, and play on pretty much everything.
Amazon MP3s have no DRM, and pretty much everything in the iTunes Music Store is also DRM free these days.
That said, your rant about money is absurd and misses the point. It's not about money; it's about expectations.
One month per month? That's a really bad joke.
It's as though they're trying to make sure their early adopters are unhappy, and don't recommend them, or generate positive publicity.
If any of those location-based services was as big as twitter, I'd fully expect some crime.
Not only for the reason teuobk noted, but because many schools have a time limit on how long they'll consider a credit valid towards graduation.
If memory serves, the penalty was either 7 euro or 12 euro per kilogram.
No, it isn't.
If I know that X laws need reform, I'll hire lawyers who are very familiar with X laws to review possible changes, their effects, and how they would use those laws, to try to avoid making a bad situation worse.
On the flip side, if I want X laws strengthened, I'd still hire lawyers who are familiar with X laws, to figure out how to make them stronger, and plug the holes.
As such, I'd contend that Obama's hiring of lawyers who specialized in IP tells us only that his administration is interested in gaining expertise in the application of IP law.
That said, I tend to be a lot less outraged about politics than other HN'ers.
http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html <-- for your reference.
Skewed dates might be more accurate, but they'd also be more confusing in a lot of use cases than simply using the print date everywhere.
The man who invented sliced bread didn't make it popular. It was initially viewed as a bad idea. Acceptance required the selling efforts of Wonder Bread, and even then it took a number of years before most consumers decided that it was a good idea.
History is rife with examples of products and services that became incredibly popular, but had slow uptake. Lack of initial acceptance proves almost nothing about the usefulness, quality, or long-term viability of the product.
2) I take formal classes in my areas of weakness.
3) I schedule my time rigorously.
That's hardly the same as having posted 'I am intending to default on my loan.'
2) I'd talk to financial professionals to figure out how to structure things for maximum gain (e.g. what can you legally write off? can you create retirement programs for yourself? etc.)
3) I'd take classes in my areas of weakness, so I'm better prepared for the Next Big Thing.
That's exactly what happened. It was apparently dial-up space many years ago.
I say many, because the space in question has been under my control since 2005, and it's STILL on the dynamic ip list, despite a roughly annual attempt to get de-listed.
The first (and only) item I checked was a Kindle that had 1066 bids placed on it, before selling for $159.90. At $0.75/bid, that means BigDeal received $959.40 for a $259 item.
Even a sucker bet at the casino is far, far better value than that. (And more transparent as well.)
Getting off the lists is an enormous pain in the ass. They make absurd demands, like changing the rDNS on every single IP in the block to contain the word static.... as though breaking rDNS is a good idea.
My business partner's wife is visually impaired, and he wired up his house with a whole-house stereo, mics in each room, and a speech recognition daemon, attached to each mic. He then wrote a huge pile of scripts for things his wife might need to do.
Now she can ask the house about the weather, control the thermostat, check the status of the garage doors and locks, turn on/off lights, open/close blinds, make phone calls, change the music, and a few other things I can't remember.
It's all a tad too expensive to be a commodity, but overall I believe it cost him something in the $40k neighborhood, which is incredibly reasonable for something that makes his wife far more autonomous.