Microsoft, US Justice Dept.: If you copy you're supporting terrorism

[slave]

http://zdnet.com.com/2100-1105-992468.html

Quote:

"Organized crime syndicates are frequently engaged in many types of illicit enterprises, including supporting terrorist activities," Malcolm said. "All components of the Justice Department...will do everything within their power to make sure that intellectual property piracy does not become a vehicle for financing or supporting acts of terror."

Is it just me or is everything "supporting terror" these days?

[slave]

Here's another terrible article:

http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/03/13/HNfilefund_2.html

Quote:

Representative John Carter, a Texas Republican, suggested that college students would stop downloading if some  were prosecuted and received sentences of 33 months or longer, like the defendants in the DOJ's Operation Buccaneer. "I think it'd be a good idea to go out and actually bust a couple of these college kids," Carter said. "If you want to see college kids duck and run, you let them read the papers and somebody's got a 33-month sentence in the federal penitentiary for downloading copyrighted materials."

 :mad:    :mad:

[pkd_lives]

Lets not mention that precious stones and metals support terrorism, or tiranic and brutal regimes, or the fact that if you use OIL you are probably directly financing terrorism, and are supporting non democratic, monarchies and tiranies.

Or that if you buy a diamond you are probably buying an item that someone was killed for, or as a result of, and are at the very least continuing support for a system that causes many deaths.

Not to mention that these political leaders should all be in jail for attempting to kill me by polluting my air with the emmissions from their cars or through allowing people to smoke in public areas, or in the case of the Texan guy allowing people to drink and drive.

When people like that get off their ass and protect real peoples rights then I might listen to their views, until then they are just more biased, self interested, self promoting, power grabbing hooligans and they can basically go fuck themselves. Did they put pressure to have M$ punished for their crimes - did they bollocks, until they show some balls and stand up and be counted they just number among the many many cowards that are in power but do nothing to stop companies like M$ removing all our rights.

The Barons would have killed Bill Gates, instead of following the spirit of the Magna Carta they curled up and hid away. Wimps like this don't deserve the platform they have to spout their pointless pro M$ bullshit.

[ March 14, 2003: Message edited by: Linux Frank ]

[mobrien_12]

According to MS, MPAA, and the justice dept., piracy equals organized crime and terrorism.

What this means (but they are not saying) is that DMCA, Fritz chips, Palladium, MS "activation" etc are vital tools to protect US citizens from violence and terrorism.

The next "logical" conclusion is that we must sacrifice fair use rights to protect the country.

[jtpenrod]

quote:Is it just me or is everything "supporting terror" these days?

Unfortunately, it isn't just you.    :mad:   "Terrorism" is getting to be the latest "Big Red Scare". They're here! They're there! They're Everywhere! Of course, they go on and on about how you're "supproting terrorism" if you smoke a joint, or rip a CD, or, well, do just about anything except fill the tank of that monstrous SUV that you never needed (how many of those things ever see a dirt road?    :rolleyes:  ). Let's just not mention how the Saudi royal family has been paying tribute to terrorist organizations for decades, or how His Bushness has been doing business with these folks, and even with Osama's own family. That would be too impolitic of us.      

quote: Last year, as previously reported, a bill was introduced to Congress that originally was designed to address the hologram issue. But it morphed into something that would make it a federal felony for people to try and trick devices into playing their own music or running their own computer programs.

How's that for a scary thought. How dare me for presuming to run my own programs on the system I bought and paid for!    :eek:   WTF???????    :eek:    :eek:    :eek:  

We are all in some very deep shit here, for the inmates are truly running the asylum.
_____________________________________
Live Free or Die: Linux

Their fundamental design flaws are completely concealed by their superficial design flaws.

[DJ]

http://maddox.xmission.com/musicindustry.html" target="_blank">

quote: Less than 8 years ago, cassette tapes were considered by most to be the best medium for music (until CD players were more affordable). How much did the average cassette tape cost? I figure approximately $8. For $8, you got the reel of tape, the molded plastic around the reel of tape, tape gears, screws to hold the tape together, the case, and all sorts of neat looking labels on the outside of the tape. All for $8.

Now look at CDs. How much does the average CD cost? I figure $14. For $14, you get a case, a paper jacket depicting the artist, and a CD. Which of these two mediums are most likely to be more difficult to manufacture? How much does it cost for the plastic and coating of a CD? I've found that the plastic in a CD costs less than 3 cents to press. So how the hell is the extra $6 justified??? The CD jacket? Couldn't be, most CDs I have only have a single piece of paper on the inside and the back. The case couldn't be what's costing us all the money, since the plastic in a CD case costs little more than the plastic in a CD. Take a look at these figures:

For 500 C40-49:59 "Ready for Retail" Cassette Tapes with J-card + 4 panels costs: $983.00

For 500 "Ready for Retail" Compact Discs with 4 panels and tray card costs: $1725.00

What justifies the difference in almost $800 in price? The truth is that the music industry is greedy. They can charge us anything they want for music because they have enough money to buy the rights to an artist. The price of CDs should have been drastically reduced by now, to at least the cost of a tape if not less, but it hasn't. That's why all the big shot executives shit a brick when people started distributing music in MP3 format over the internet. Finally, people could get out of their web of bullshit and only listen to music they wanted to listen to, at a user-established cost. Good I say, let them suffer. It's about time they got screwed like they've been screwing us for all these years.

I think that pretty much sums it up

Dj

[avello500]

ive been involved in the music industry to one extent or another ot several years.
at least 85% of the business is controlled by organized crime.
look at shug knight, he held artiss over the balcolny till they signed royalty rights away. phil specter would shoot at artists for NO reason. frank sinatra? its well known that the mob got involved in the 50's and never looked back.
ive seen it all the way down to local clubs. there has been one club that has lasted for more than 20 years here while the others have come and gone. it was owned by one person, until he owed to much money to some BuSiNeSs    men. now they own and run things.
most new artists are so fucking ripped off its pathetic. look at salt and peppa, skid row, hell any of the VH1 horror stories. most new artits make if they are lucky, 3% of record sales, then they have to pay for all the costs involved out of the 3%. shit most new artists owe hundred of thousands of dollars just by signing thier first contract.
to be a musician without  business, promotion, and production skills is as bad as pulling your pants to your knees and running thru a gay swingers bar. actually i think the music biz is worse than that.
there isnt a damn thing any government is going todo because the biz is paying so much money for freedom.
if you want to change things , no matter what country, just go and buy independant music, stay away from big labels all together.  oh and stop watching that stupid fucking mtv.
ya i know what the tits look nice but its killing music.


oh to be on topic:
if you look tru history mankind has been nothing more than a stumbling demented child king bent on his own mass destruction. that wont change anytime soon because evolution takes thousands of years.
all the politicians, all over the world, are to scared of the skelons in their own closets to stand up and tell the truth, until they do its going to get alot worse then what it is now.

[slave]

I have an idea.  Why don't all the people with sense pack up and move to Mars? (Or iceland)

[avello500]

id rather goto venus, i hear thats where the women are.

[slave]

Nah, I'd rather make my own female companions from scratch, with genetic engineering.  They can have dog brains so all they want to do is lick you and stick their butts in your face.    

[devlkore]

Do any of you know about East Timor?

Well, when STufF like that stops happening, I'll consider stopping my pirating.

LA!

Also, everyone on my course (at uni) has pirate softare, it's the only way we can study at home, so I guess we're all funding terrorism, despite everything being FREE!

[slave]

You may not be supporting terrorism when you use proprietary software, but are you *are* supporting the makers, even if you never paid for it.  You see, the makers of proprietary software aren't damaged at all by your "piracy" of software (since copying has no direct effect on them and you'd have never paid for it in the first place) but what you are doing is reinforcing its use, which monopolies thrive on.  It allows them to still make money while at the same time preventing free/open source alternatives from being widely adopted.  I'm afraid a lot of software companies are too stupid to realize the fact: software copying helps them keep their monopolies.

[devlkore]

I don't fully understand what you said, although I got certain bits of it, could you rephrase?

LA!

Just so you know, I've never paid for any pirate material and neither has anyone I know, we all just download off the internet and copy to/from each other. Most of it is necessary (for uni, etc) and some of it is moral, ie, I always copy MS software if I need it, I will NEVER buy it and some of it is for entertainment, eg, games, but even then, it tends to be to try it out, or if I/we can't afford it; dunno 'bout you lot, but I can't afford to pay

[avello500]

quote: Nah, I'd rather make my own female companions from scratch, with genetic engineering. They can have dog brains so all they want to do is lick you and stick their butts in your face.  

im sold. sign me up for three.

[pkd_lives]

Originally posted by devlkore:
[QB]I don't fully understand what you said, although I got certain bits of it, could you rephrase?

He means : Those who pirate software, would usually not pay for that software in the first place. They can't afford it, or whatever, so the only reason they have it is because they pirated it.

Because of this the companies that produce this software are not loosing money when someone pirates. Because they would not have sold that copy in the first place.

However you are using that companies software, and eventually you will end up in a position where you may buy it, or decide to buy it in whatever company you work for. Therefore you will support this company.

There are many options - many superior - to pirating software, free and open source to mention two. Instead of using them the pirates use copies of proprietary software. This means that when you are in a postion you will buy this proprietary stuff, because that is what you are used to. Whereas if you used open source you would use open source stuff in the future, and those proprietary companies would loose money, in the long run.

The fact that pirated copies are being used is slowing down the adoption of open source, because of the pirating mentality. By using proprietary software, you are encouraging the further use of proprietary software, as well as their proprietary file formats. When you use proprietary file formats you force other people to use that software.

And most software companies are too blind to see that piracy is the ONLY way people will keep on using their software. If they do not have that base of people who are familiar only with their software, they will have no customers in a few years time. When people use Open Source, they tend to end up converted eventually.

Linux User is presnting us with the plain and simple viewpoint that the battle between Open Source and Proprietary is being fought in the educational facilities of the world. If you guys leave having used Open Source and not proprietary programs, you will carry on doing so when you leave school, because the proprietary programs are only a little better as a whole at the moment, and that is only because they have had 10-20 years more development against the two or three most Open source applications have had. It is up to you, and everyone else at university, college and school to force you school systems to allow you the choice. At the very least they cannot insist you use any proprietary file format, because there are open versions that are available to all applications (mp3 = ogg; doc = txt, rtf for easy examples).

There is no need to pirate software, and the people who do only support the current regime. The  people who pirate are directly supporting all the proprietary software companies. It is plain and simple, these people should earn our support, they have failed time and time again in the interest of their bottom line profits.

The other point to add is that you support the views and ideas of any company whose product you buy. M$ have given money to Republicans and Democrats, I do not believe democracy can exist under such conditions of financial control therefore I cannot support companies who give to any political party (anywhere). M$ are currently pumping money into India where humans can be dealt with badly merely because of the caste they were born into. I cannot support that idea, it is wrong to consider any human being as being a second class citizen. So I again cannot put any money into M$.