Tuesday, August 20, 2002

Tara Sue is running for Congress in NC and has a weblog.  I say let's all welcome Democracy into the 21st century, it's about time!  She's a libretarian and an idealist and also very young, she's 26.  Now none of these things are bad if tempered with intelligence and the wisdom of doing things right.  Realisticly I don't think she stands a chance but how many other politicians are blogging?  Her opponent is one of the RIAA's bed-buddies.  Even though she stands a good chance of losing, the things she learns this time around from all of us on the net can be of great value next time.  Either way I'd like to welcome a new political voice to the scene. comment [] 5:38:33 PM

Doc did a bit of investigation to see what Lessig says about copyright and software. "The copyright system protects software without getting any new knowledge in return. When the system protects Hemingway, we at least get to see how Hemingway writes. Software is different." When this came out, in December of last year, I broiled. So when Joshua Allen said yesterday that Lessig and I aren't buddies, he nailed it. In fact, when I publish software, I release the ideas for others to learn from and use, exactly as Hemingway does. You can see evidence in the amount of cloning that takes place around ideas I've orginated in the form of copyrighted software. It's demonstrable, easily, that the world gets something in return for my copyright. [Scripting News]  Dave gets the points across that I tried to yesterday.  Software is not just like a novel.  Software is like the education, and background and thinking of the writer who creates the novel.  You don't get that when you buy Hemingway's works, you get what it produced, the book.  Just like in software you don't get the code, you get what the code produces, the end product.  Now Open Source or free code or whatever you want to call it, is fine with me.  If you want to publish your code for all to read and use please feel free.  At the same time Proprietary software plays a role too.  After all some people want to be payed for their work.  Software is a work of the mind like a book yes that much is true.  Works of the mind are just that, work, or in simpler terms a product.  Some people choose to give their product away, others choose to sell it.  Neither is better than the other per se, the situation decides which is a better move.  This is not so much a legal issuse as a moral issue.  Unfourtanatly those get very personal and I think that's where this is heading.  Before long we'll have the The Blood Sucking Monopolist Capitalists vs. The Humanity Loving Proletariat.  One last thing Proletariat means wage earner, i.e. someone who works for money, the words meaning has gotten diluted thanks to years of Communist propaganda. comment [] 4:37:37 PM

Real looks to tame media player circus. RealNetworks introduces a new digital media player that supports all the major file formats. Can the "universal" RealOne put the company on equal footing with Windows Media? [CNET News.com]  If I get this right Real wants to make it easier on consumers by incorporating all media formats in one player right?  Then can you please explain to me why NO other player to my knowledge plays Real content with Real's persmission?  I'm still britling about what Real did with Microsoft's codec but this is getting annoying.  Even MS the big evil monopolist is more than happy to let you use their codec in your product but would Real do a thing like this? Never.  This is just another fluff piece payed for by AOL-TimeWarner.  WinAmp, which is free plays almost every file format that Real does except...wait for it...Real Audio.  comment [] 4:29:12 PM

© Copyright 2002 Michael Hellesen.