The previous version of this was deleted. I have edited it, and trust that it is acceptable now. If not, please let me know what you would like removed. Thanks.
I ran across the following, yesterday:
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"SUMMARY:
There are folders on your computer that Microsoft has tried hard to keep secret. Within these folders you will find two major things: Microsoft Internet Explorer has not been clearing your browsing history after you have instructed it to do so, and Microsoft's Outlook Express has not been deleting your e-mail correspondence after you've erased them from your Deleted Items bin. (This also includes all incoming and outgoing file attachments.) And believe me, that's not even the half of it.
When I say these files are hidden well, I really mean it. If you don't have any knowledge of DOS then don't plan on finding these files on your own. I say this because these files/folders won't be displayed in Windows Explorer at all -- only DOS. (Even after you have enabled Windows Explorer to "show all files.") And to top it off, the only way to find them in DOS is if you knew the exact location of them. Basically, what I'm saying is if you didn't know the files existed then the chances of you running across them is slim to slimmer."
It's interesting to note that Microsoft does not explain this behavior adequately at all."
http://forum.####microsoft.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=10&t=000001
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My view is we
own our computers.
Using JimH's
landlord word of yesterday (which has now disappeard from his space?), we are the
landlord of each bit that seeks squatter's rights on our machines, in
our space.
I remember when Jim once posted to a user that there was no way to remove the later version of Media Jukebox and go back to an earlier version. That would mean that the squatter's bits will never fully leave our computer. Of course, this was and is false, and I know Jim only meant 'that without resort to other non-JRiver tools (like FDisk or Ghost), it is not possible to remove each and every bit that JRiver installs in our space, and that it is not JRiver's responsibility to vacate our premises on demand.
So, we have a delicious standoff that consists of conflicting elements. As it has always been; it appears that
only the technology and weapons change. The stuff that make lawyers rich. Here are the elements:
From the highest law of the land, the US Constituiton, Article I, Section 8, "To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries"
http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.articlei.htmlAnd a warning from Harry The Hipster's great Grandfather (do any of you guys realize Harry is a retired Supreme Court Justice?):
“We must take care to guard against two extremes equally prejudicial; the one, that men (and women) of ability, who have employed their time for the service of their community, may not be deprived of their just merits, and the reward of their ingenuity and labour; the other, that the world may not be deprived of improvements, nor the progress of the arts be retarded” [Lord Mansfield in Sayre v. Moore, 1785]
And the common view that Owners/Landlords have at least the limited right to control such property, like computers, and Forums (subject to certain
common good values like (perhaps) free speech and public safety).
And the hope/fact that the public has a protected right to, eventually, be the beneficiaries of such invented property. So called Public Domain, that Prof Lesser has taken on (in NYT article on extension of Copyright).
And the Fair Use statutes (Copyright Law Tiltle
http://www.loc.gov/copyright/title17/ ).
IMHO, a lot of this can be understood in terms of
BIG versus
small. The famous, B v. S, Planet Earth Court, vol 1, page 0: [Do you know that West Law tried to copyright their citation system?]
If you are
small, you cannot look deeply into the bits a
BIG has placed on your computer. Read the licensing agreements of the
BIG, in regard to
reverse engineering and
de-compiling. Read the new Digital Millenium Copright Act.
If you are
BIG, you can use your copy of a
smaller companies software to reverse engineer, and approprate into your own product. Look at history of IE, WMP, et. al.
If you are
small, you cannot make copies of CDs you buy to listen to from your hard drive, or in your MP3 walkman.
If you are
BIG, you can appropriate a starving song writer's creation (called a Contract), and keep most of it's economic value for yourself.
So nothing really changes. What you can do, and when you can do it, has a lot to do with the size of your guns, and the size of the guns of who you know. I think, if there ever is going to be a solution to this, it is going to be based on a methodology whereby we can
only increase our slice of the pie by making the pie bigger. What that methodology can be, I do not know.
[former member]
Geez...I like Media Jukebox, and INTERACT!!
Author
Topic: Bill Gates and more double speak (Read 1660 times)