Root Access

12:01 AM

Unless I somehow get much less busy with school, no. Especially not with the huge amount of work we're starting to see from the only two-day-old school term. I'm gonna live impoverished for some more time, I fear.

nhinkle

@Ariane what year are you in school?

@somequixotic because I'm a also an employee of the university, I get office for $10 now :O

Right before I graduate I'm going to be heading into the computer lab with a 2TB hard drive and downloading allllll the free things while I still can.

somequixotic

@nhinkle darn; I had to pay $20. Price gouging!

nhinkle

@somequixotic well I had to pay $80 for the version I currently have, sooo.... yeah. The student price is actually absurdly high compared to the employee cost.

somequixotic

yeah, because students have no choice other than to buy it or they fail their class; so they can charge whatever they want

the employees just won't work there if they can't get good deals

Ariane

@nhinkle For me, only from Adobe as far as I know. (And even the massively reduced price is still unfathomable so I steal it. My school (my program anyway) doesn't have programs like, you know, those people who have MSDN and can have Windows for free and stuff. The programmers in the other building get some stuff including a laptop lent for free, but not us.

Our more expensive computer labs at school (mostly expensive because of the poor shopping choices the people who do the buying make) eat up all of the budget, I guess.

somequixotic

12:05 AM

Adobe's Creative Cloud is still really expensive for a student

it's like $50/month

Ariane

Was it that bad?

Also I'm in my last year in college. I planned to maybe go to university, but I can't afford to live in a bigger and more expensive city, so if I decide to go, it'll have to be once I've made some money and made myself more comfortable.

Boris_yo

@Ariane Can't you choose to live in campus at university?

Ariane

@Boris_yo That's much more expensive than my current apartment, even for the crappiest shared-bathroom room. Don't underestimate big cities. :p

nhinkle

@somequixotic Creative Cloud is a ripoff.

@Boris_yo on campus housing is also a ripoff

@Ariane anybody who's a student can get Dreamspark for free though.

dreamspark.com

somequixotic

superuser.com/review/suggested-edits/141136

that almost made me wonder if it was a review audit =D

Ariane

12:19 AM

@nhinkle Oh, that's nice I guess. Never heard of or used such a program though.

Oliver Salzburg

The only software that matters is free anyway!

somequixotic

@Ariane if you have a .edu email address, you're set

nhinkle

@Ariane free for all students. Includes all MS developer tools (Visual Studio, etc.) as well as Windows Server.

Ariane

@somequixotic I don't have such a thing.

somequixotic

@nhinkle is it bad to reject suggested edits because they're too trivial, even if they in fact help the post (trivially, that is)?

superuser.com/review/suggested-edits/141128

Ariane

12:21 AM

@nhinkle I guess those would be useful if I were a software developer or ran a server. Sounds handy for programming students though.

somequixotic

@Ariane or for giving away to programmers who can't get their own, or selling them ;-)

Ariane

That's rather... not nice.

somequixotic

says she who pirates PhotoShop

nhinkle

@somequixotic that would be pretty squarely illegal, since a) piracy, and b) not licensed for commercial use

@somequixotic that's sort of borderline. I'd approve it, others might not.

somequixotic

@nhinkle duh :P well she freely admitted to pirating PhotoShop so her morals can't be that strong

personally? I wouldn't do it

even if I thought there was a minuscule risk of getting caught

nhinkle

12:26 AM

If I see one or two like that, I wouldn't care, but if a user was going around rep farming by making lots of truly trivial edits, I'd hit 'em for it.

somequixotic

@nhinkle yeah, I agree, was just checking

Ariane

Stealing software for personal use and reselling software are two completely different things I say.

somequixotic

no they're not; they're both illegal and morally wrong

Ariane

Lemme make you an obvious picture.

somequixotic

that's like saying murdering your neighbor in cold blood and genocide are two completely different things -- either one could land you life in prison, except the latter might also get you decapitated by an angry mob... still...

Ariane

12:29 AM

Stealing money from someone and violently killing them after a violent rape. Or stealing a game to play for yourself compared to stealing that game and setting up a private server with which you make money from the players.

Both comparisons comprise wrong things, but on very different levels.

somequixotic

so it's OK to knowingly do wrong, illegal things as long as you limit the scope to only one individual or a few individuals?

I don't think a judge would see it that way

"aw, it's ok, let her go. she only stole one copy of the software."

I personally feel that it's slightly immoral for companies to be selling software in the first place for several hundreds or thousands of dollars if you're just digitally downloading it and never contacting them about it; it's exploitative, and they could do so much more good for the world if they'd open source it... however, two wrongs don't make a right, and pirating proprietary software because proprietary software is bad is a non-sequitur.

Ariane

I'm not saying what I'm doing is right, I'm saying that making money out of something you get for free like that is far below it.

Not to mention that I hardly have a choice. Even the reduced student price for the Creative suite is far above my capabilities, and I need it for school.

somequixotic

don't they have it on lab computers at school?

or surely you could go to your professor and say, "look, there is literally no way that I can afford this software, is there any way I could get it for a further reduced price or to use some other computer that has it installed? what is your suggestion?"

then, if your professor tells you to pirate the software, you report them to the Dean, and get their ass fired, and probably get a free copy of the software from Adobe when the Dean calls them up and explains the situation. Or your professor finds some way to work out a way for you to use the software or buy it at a price you can afford, and you're done.

Ariane

They do. Only the recent versions in one class that for that reason is the most popular with teachers for classes, and as such it's rarely free. And seriously I can't be staying at school every evening and go back and forth to eat and sleep and even go on week-ends, and be completely unable to do anything about my homework at all while at home.

somequixotic

Ah, so it's a convenience factor. It's convenient for you to pirate it. It's always interesting to hear people justify illegal actions. I say that as a (former...) student of sociology (took a few classes in it as electives); the mental tricks we play on ourselves, oy vey...

I agree that there are various degrees of wrongness, and that killing someone is obviously a more severe crime than pirating a piece of software, and pirating is more severe than jay walking, but I always find it interesting to hear people justify their illegal actions, because it shows how they can convince themselves that somehow if they can get away with something wrong that it's justifiable... as if they had no other choice. There's always a choice.

Journeyman Geek

12:42 AM

heh

Ariane

I think you're just picking on me. If you bring the level of "need" to mere physical possibility and survival, then I certainly don't need much.

Journeyman Geek

@somequixotic: I've reached the stage where I feel guilty with most stuff I pirate, and end up buying it anyway ;p

nhinkle

IDK much about Canada's copyright laws, but you could easily argue @somequixotic that Adobe is just failing to balance the economics of their pricing model, and that if they priced their software more reasonably, more people would buy if it were more convenient than pirating.

Journeyman Geek

unless its clearly impossible to get legitimately

nhinkle

I don't have any pirated software on my computer, but I can totally see why people would.

Journeyman Geek

12:44 AM

@nhinkle: my copy of OS/2 fell off the back of a truck, so to speak

somequixotic

@nhinkle Of that I have no doubt, and that's true in every single country in the world; Adobe's software is universally overpriced for all but the top 0.0001% of the population; that said, it's still indisputably illegal. I haven't decided whether it's always morally wrong to break the law, but it sure as heck would be rare to find circumstances where it's morally right.

Ariane

Teachers recommend to pirate it during school and then buy it at the student price just before you graduate if you've been able to save up the money. And seriously I completely agree with them. It's indecent to expect someone to either psychologically break down by killing oneself to try to eventually get some homework done at school or pay 20 $ a month ('Cause apparently they don't sell CS at a student price anymore) for a subscription that gives access to the software.

nhinkle

@somequixotic so you would comply with an NSA national security letter compelling you to produce personal information that you've promised in your TOS to protect, and would feel that you were doing the right thing?

Journeyman Geek

@somequixotic: I'm not sure morals come into it at all for me ;p

nhinkle

I mean that's the law, after all.

Journeyman Geek

12:48 AM

lemme give you an example. Friend of mine sent me an ARC of a book he'd bought. Company that publishes has a clue (Baen) and I loved the book. I think I currently have two copies of the book (one physical, one e-book from a bundle) and all his other books. Buying the book = writer gets a paycheck = more books ;p

In that case, piracy made a sale

somequixotic

@nhinkle I would, but then I'd get the hell out of that business right after that. Might be too late for some users, but if the service is closed down, at least there won't be any future users to get hurt. Cf. Lavabit and Groklaw.

Journeyman Geek

@somequixotic: they apparently do that pretty often, or demand you keep their monitoring hardware on your premises

somequixotic

It's not like the NSA can force a business to remain in operation. There are a million ways that you could comply with the law while not offering your service. What, are they going to make it illegal for you to have ongoing (pseudo-permanent) "technical difficulties" preventing anyone from accessing your site?

nhinkle

@somequixotic and would you do that because you thought it was moral or because you were afraid of the law?

Ariane

Also if they don't sell CS at a student price anymore it sort of makes the teachers' plan void, since the only thing there is now is the Creative Cloud's monthly subscription.

nhinkle

12:49 AM

My point is that the law is not always written with the best interests of the people in mind.

Journeyman Geek

@somequixotic: I think PJ was quitting anyway. She just wanted to do it a little dramatically. A week later, groklaw is back with a new editor.

nhinkle

@Ariane you can still buy CS6

Journeyman Geek

@nhinkle: it could be argued what the NSA is doing is clearly illegal

Ariane

@nhinkle I can't see it on their website.

somequixotic

@nhinkle It's not a matter of fear. It's a matter of the rule of law. If we get to pick and choose which laws we obey, we'll have people (not to pick on her but she's the convenient example) like Ariane who can justify pirating software. People who can justify going 90 mph in a 65 mph zone "because they were in a hurry", and risk others' lives. You get the picture.

nhinkle

12:52 AM

@somequixotic my point is merely that in some cases, not following the law may be more moral, if following the law were to be so immoral.

somequixotic

It's not a fact that, for every law, for each possible application of that law to a practical circumstance, that it is necessarily the best outcome for all parties involved; however, it is a broken society indeed that operates in a way that just allows people to pick and choose what they personally feel is their personal legal code, and obey that, and ignore whatever the rest of society thinks, without regard for who they're harming in the process.

Journeyman Geek

@somequixotic: that might reflect that the laws are out of touch with current social mores or even reality

nhinkle

Took a lot of clicks, but: adobe.com/products/catalog/…

Not cheap by any means, but you can get Design Standard for $450 still.

somequixotic

Basically our society is turning into Saints Row IV. Stopped behind some idiot in traffic that won't move? Just drive on the sidewalk and hit random people; who cares if you kill 5 or 6 schmucks? You have places to go!!

Journeyman Geek

you mean, there's aliens?

Parris

12:54 AM

does anyone know anything about postfix (sigh) ?superuser.com/questions/637507/…

somequixotic

lol, that too

@Parris re-write your question without the word "noob" and it might get some good attention on ServerFault. I'd say edit your question and request moderator migration to ServerFault.

nhinkle

Reductio ad absurdum

Reductio ad absurdum (Latin: "reduction to absurdity"), also known as argumentum ad absurdum (Latin: argument to absurdity), is a common form of argument which seeks to demonstrate that a statement is true by showing that a false, untenable, or absurd result follows from its denial, or in turn to demonstrate that a statement is false by showing that a false, untenable, or absurd result follows from its acceptance. First appearing in classical Greek philosophy (the Latin term derives from the Greek "εις άτοπον απαγωγή" or eis atopon apagoge, "reduction to the impossible", for example in Ar...

somequixotic

postfix is pseudo on-topic for SU, but most of our userbase won't be experts on it.

Ariane

Thing is, by my actions I risk nothing but an extremely unlikely lawsuit and Adobe getting 0.000000000000000001% less money. On the other hand I get to do awesome things like, ya know, affording my medication and eating.

Also @nhinkle That's almost a decent price, only half the value of my PC. Except that only Master Collection includes the components I need.

nhinkle

@Ariane what all do you need?

Ariane

12:57 AM

Also, whoa, English uses so many smart-sounding Latin terms for simple things. o.o

nhinkle

Have you looked at the Production and Web premium suites?

Parris

@somequixotic awesome thanks!

nhinkle

@user99572isfine are you just straight-up removing them? If so, let us put in a request to just have the tag outright burninated.

somequixotic

It's mighty weird to be stuck in the shoes of defending a position that Adobe -- a company I hate -- might take, but I actually have a stake in this game, and it's more than just an abstract unequivocal adherence to the law. Y'see, Copyright Law is the very foundation upon which Free Software is based. Without Copyright being a meaningful, enforced thing, the provisions of the GPL are meaningless. That's why it hurts me more, particularly, when someone violates copyright law than, say, >>

Ariane

@nhinkle Let's see... Photoshop, Illustrator, Flash, Audition, Premiere, Dreamweaver (somewhat), InDesign (haven't used it since the InDesign class two years ago but if we're talking about what I need in theory for the program).

somequixotic

12:59 AM

personal assault or traffic violations. It's because I think that continual violation of copyright law erodes its enforceability and it means that it'll be less likely to be respected in the future, especially with regards to Free Software licensed projects.

nhinkle

@Ariane wow. So you do need all the things.

I would love to continue this discussion, but it's time for me to head home. Have fun, folks!

Ariane

@nhinkle Not aaaaaall. Like, eh, I don't use Prelude or After Effects. >.>

nhinkle

@Ariane well yeah. But you need stuff for video production and print production. Which makes it pricey.

Friend of mine recently got a used laptop for $800 that had CS6 master suite on it... and supposedly it's not pirated (not sure if she was able to verify, but it does seem to work). Ridiculously good deal. Or possibly stolen.

Ariane

@nhinkle Uh-huh. That's what it means to be diversified. Although admittedly, Premiere, I could probably go without, somewhat, since a lot of the video work is done in teams.

nhinkle

@Ariane if you can do without premier, then web premium has all you need.

Ariane

1:03 AM

@nhinkle Yeah, laptop + CS for less than the price of CS is suspicious. Not that I think it's all tha bad.

nhinkle

Wait no - Audition. Oops.

Anyways. Gotta go. Goodnight folks!

Ariane

Yeah. And even Web Premium is ridiculously above what I can afford.

Bye!

At best if it were software I really needed I could maybe scrape up 100 - 200 big max - dollars. Thing is, Adobe doesn't work that way.

somequixotic

@Ariane Well, FWIW, if I can get this WindowBlinds theme working properly so that it is left-aligning all the titles and looking exactly like Windows 8, I will buy you a legally licensed copy of WindowBlinds, so you don't have to pirate it, or even be tempted to do so. But right now my idea is just vaporware until I puzzle out SkinStudio.

Ariane

@somequixotic Don't buy me anything. I don't care for window title alignment enough to invest or want anyone to invest anything but reputation in it.

Psycogeek

@Ariane Even if adobee gives things away for students, eventually you will be paying them back. Try to Unlearn adobee :-) Even an easier to use program, becomes like going back to kindergarden again.

Ariane

1:06 AM

@somequixotic Also, you can't blame on a single crime the fact that the crime, repeated by several people, has bad consequences, the same way as you can't deny that if everyone acted like you, things would be bad. Both reasonings are wrong. Although both would please a philosophy teacher. :p

Journeyman Geek

also, didn't the CS cloud leave you with a working copy of the product at the end?

Ariane

@JourneymanGeek Creative Cloud only gives you access to the software for as long as you pay your subscription.

somequixotic

@Ariane "If everyone acted like me?" I explicitly avoid doing things that I know are illegal, and at times I've suffered greatly for it (in the sense that I have lacked or been unable to do things that might have personally benefited me). But I'm still standing, I'm a productive member of society, and generally content with the way things are. I don't see how that's "bad".

On the flip side, people who've done illegal things, and then been caught and convicted, have suffered WAAAAY worse than I have, due to the harsh punishments of the justice system.

Psycogeek

@somequixotic heck just a trip to court , is 1/2 the punisment of the us judicial system

somequixotic

The people who haven't yet been convicted of their crimes are living on borrowed time, like cheating in life -- they don't suffer the personal setbacks of obeying the law, and they don't suffer the immense mental and physical abuse of living in a prison. It would seem on the surface to be the best of both worlds. But you and I both know that it's unsustainable, because if everyone did that, they'd just increase surveillance, and catch everyone.

Maybe that's exactly what they're doing, after all.

A great reckoning to make up for years of people getting off easy.

Frankly, part of me welcomes it.

Part of me is terrified of what our society will become due to it.

Ariane

1:12 AM

@somequixotic Generally speaking I follow the law more than your average citizen and I annoy my mother for it. Following the law and being rightful is also a big part of why I'm so poor. However it's common logic to be able to see that it is rather hard to in ful lconscience tell me not to pirate software when there's no other remotely reasonable solution.

somequixotic

You're right; I can't tell you not to do it. I'm not a judge or a law enforcement officer.

I can only say what I feel is what I'd do in those circumstances.

Ariane

Also, know that a simple person doign copyright infringment for personal use even in the extremely unlikely case that someone will care and catch them... won't really face a very harsh punishment, because they know they probably can't afford the punishment anyway. Whenever the person has a bigger scheme or somehow makes money off it, however, then the punishment gets much harsher.

That Brazilian Guy

@Ariane There's quite a lot of actual cases of people being sued by the RIAA, MPAA, etc and being fined thousands of dollars

somequixotic

I know how things work in practice. At college, my classmates would trade pirated anime, music, movies, even test answers over the campus LAN. Gigabytes upon gigabytes worth. Did any of them ever go to jail? No.

Ariane

Also when it's reasonably possible for me to do so, I do intend to purchase the software I need. Hey, it's not like I'm not trying to be law-abiding. I could've pirated all I wanted, but because despite it being a bit costy I could afford the greatly discounted Windows 8 earlier this year, I bought it.

@ThatBrazilianGuy Pretty sure they were doing something bigger than strictly personal use.

@somequixotic Lol, test answers. Your classmates are quite something.

That Brazilian Guy

1:17 AM

@somequixotic In my country, it is very, very hard to find a computer with non-pirated software. I think in 20 years I have only witnessed a single institution with all their machines free of piracy. All their 5 of it, back in 1998.

somequixotic

China is the same way.

Ariane

@ThatBrazilianGuy Institution? Institutions, with their budget, pirate stuff? Sheesh.

somequixotic

Institutions in South America aren't as rich as in the US.

They probably look at it through the same lens as you do.

"Well, we have no choice".

That Brazilian Guy

@somequixotic No, no, no, no. It is a cultural issue. "Everyone does it, so why don't we?" + "Brazil, land of total and complete impunity".

Joseph Weissman

Software licensing is ridiculous anyway.

Sorry :) I mean, it's frustrating.

somequixotic

1:20 AM

Except Free Software licensing. That's quite nice.

That Brazilian Guy

@somequixotic People here pirate those overly priced $0.50 android apps.

Joseph Weissman

(I think it's the redundant, ridiculously-parallel work it seems to force us into...)

Ariane

@ThatBrazilianGuy Lol, even I has purchased a few Android apps.

have*

That Brazilian Guy

@Ariane I haven't been in that many institutions, this is my first year as employee of one and very occasinally I did maintenance jobs in non-home scenarios. But piracy here is so ingrained, it is common to find people amazed by the fact MS Office is not part of windows.

somequixotic

@JosephWeissman That part is truly annoying and wasteful. Why do we need 5000 of the same type of system in every company in every country? The same VBA macros written over and over again... the same accounting systems... the same login pages... despite an incredible potential for efficiencies due to near zero-cost copying, we continue to live in a society where digital bits are nearly as expensive as producing physical items out of natural resources.

2

Joseph Weissman

1:21 AM

Yeah, it's bonkers.

At some point I think we have to consider compelling open source for large companies

And really it's IP in general that's such a mess

somequixotic

The agency I work for is starting to turn it around in that regard. There's no official policy yet, but if only for the pragmatic purposes of saving money, they're starting to switch to leveraging open source software, and buying fewer proprietary software licenses.

That Brazilian Guy

@somequixotic It's worse. Your digital bits take in consideration the efforts of being developed. But for ebooks, what justifies a real book being $30 and an ebook being $25? What, I ask? USB taxes?

Ariane

@ThatBrazilianGuy Lol. Well, honestly, sounds like here just a decade or so ago. Now people are gradually getting more honest with software, but before, literally everyone pirated everything. And it was obvious too, because back then it was still a common distribution mode to give burned CDs with marker inscriptions on it. People were even selling pirated Windows copies for 10 $, stuff like that... and actually people were so clueless that many never realized it wasn't legal.

somequixotic

@ThatBrazilianGuy Well it depends on how much the infrastructure costs to maintain it, and the people to maintain it, and all that -- but I can't see that $25 being spent entirely on hosting costs for a large company like Amazon.

If it were a small company with low volume sales, I could see $25 being a reasonable price. They have to keep the lights on.

But at the scale of Amazon's digital sales, no way do they need $25 per purchase to turn a profit.

That Brazilian Guy

somequixotic

1:26 AM

@ThatBrazilianGuy are those illegal copies being sold on a street?

Ariane

@somequixotic If people only charged what they needed to charge, pretty sure all the software on my computer, if I bought it all legally, would not go above 150-200 $ in cost.

That Brazilian Guy

There is a really huge open air market here in Rio where you can buy a wide range of assorted items, usually cheap Chinese stuff. And PC/xbox/ps2/ps3 games/software for about $10 per disc.

@somequixotic Yes. And no one does anything.

Land of impunity, remember?

See the "metro" plate? It means subway.

somequixotic

@Ariane You'll get no argument from me. There's a lot of way overpriced software out there that, unfortunately, people depend on, for lack of better options, or unwillingness to try the alternatives, or social needs like college.

Ariane

@somequixotic That's actually smart in a way. If you're being that obvious about it, it just takes a bit of naivety for people to think it's legal. And even without that, if someone doesn't act suspicious, even if you think there's a good chance what they're doing is legal, you're going to have a doubt, and likely do nothing, because "certainly, no one can sell me illegal stuff and be so blatant about it".

somequixotic

I can be against doing illegal things while also wishing that proprietary software were more reasonably priced, and more Free Software were used as standard. These are compatible viewpoints.

Ariane

1:29 AM

Yeah, of course.

somequixotic

@Ariane It helps if it's extremely common nation-wide, too. :P

as apparently it is, per Ruda's claim

Ariane

Though really, so far what I've tried in terms of free alternatives wasn't worth much.

@somequixotic Yeah. Looks even worse than those "DVD, DVD, DVD!" vendors, the classic of the chinatown in New York.

Though it is a classic though. When you visit New York, you just must go to China Town and buy a fake. A fake anything, just a fake. It's the one souvenir you just must get from New York City.

I wanted to get a fake millionaire's watch, but it was too late already and the shady vendors had gone off to hide already. I did get two fake pashmina scarves though. They're awesomely comfy for their low price, and they're the pieces of clothing that have lasted me the longest, despite extended use. :D

That Brazilian Guy

Back in 2009, I watched a talk by the president of the national association of cybercafes. Five years ago, apparently about 70% or more of the internet access in the country was in cybercafes (it's a huge country, so there are big metropolis and big countrisides, that explains the number).
Anyway, he stated a big reason for Windows popularity here was, people would get to know windows in (pirated) copies in cybercafes, then use pirated Windows at home, then Windows would be the choice of use at work, and MS would profit from the small parcentage of legit Windows sales, because of lock-in.

somequixotic

@Ariane You know... I don't have all the facts around this particular technical area (photo/video production software), but it wouldn't surprise me in the least if software like The GIMP can't legally do everything that Photoshop does because of software patents.

Ariane

Haha... That's... a sort of business plan. xD

somequixotic

1:34 AM

Those are the worst. You can't even legally implement a piece of Free Software, even if you have infinite time and resources, that does something that a proprietary program does. Guaranteed irrelevance for the free software program.

That Brazilian Guy

@somequixotic I remember once reading years ago Microsoft was patenting double-click.

@somequixotic The medical field isn't much different from that.

Ariane

@somequixotic Hmmmmmmmm......... I don't know. Maybe, maybe not. I'm not sure they can put a patent on a behaviour. They can patent a technology (like Apple patented their Siri vocal assistant), but not the general principle (I think Apple failed to sue other attempts at creating a mobile assistant with similar functions).

That Brazilian Guy

In fact, in order to save lives, the government once chose to break the patent on HIV vaccines.

somequixotic

@Ariane I'm looking at a phone on my desk that, essentially, is Siri (not the same code, but a re-implementation thereof). So that one failed. XD

But they can patent certain algorithms for sure.

In the 3d rendering world, we suffer from patents on things like Floating Point Textures and S3 Texture Compression, which are basically descriptions of applied mathematical formulae and concepts, which are patented, and can't be implemented by Free Software graphics drivers.

These things are essential because specifications and standards require their use.

Similarly, a Free Software program could be forced to be incompatible with Adobe formats if Adobe patents, and then requires a certain algorithm to use those formats.

Ariane

Yeah, but there are tons of ways of reaching a same or similar result, normally. Though can't argue that with the huge team of highly paid people behind Photoshop, a free or low-cost competitor would have a hard time keeping up, especially with how much of a headstart Adobe has. If Adobe charges the ridiculous prices that they do, it's because they,re so liked, so unique and such that they know they actually can charge that.

somequixotic

1:41 AM

You know what doesn't make any sense to me? I actually think that Adobe would make more money (more revenue and profit) by selling the Adobe Creative Suite Master Collection for $100 per user (physical person) and allowing them to install it on as many computers as that person normally uses. For businesses they'd have to buy one license per employee; for home users, you could install it on your desktop and laptop.

In fact, I think they'd be richer than Apple. They would make an absolute killing.

The few licenses they do sell for $4000+ are nothing compared to the bazillions of licenses they'd sell at $100.

Ariane

Actually I think they've studied the question and seen that their clientele is so overwhelmingly businesses who will buy it regardless of the price that your normal person doesn't even count.

With how much money they have, I think I can at least trust them with scheming, or hiring someone to scheme, good money-making plans.

somequixotic

Really? I think a lot of normal people would use certain parts of it as "casual users" from time to time, like doing the occasional advanced touchups on their birthday party video before uploading it to youtube, or doing some creative editing of a photo.

I really think they would sell a buttload of licenses to individuals.

College students are just the beginning. Even programmers like me who only rarely create content would buy into it.

Ariane

But they're attending that market. Photoshop Elements, say. And nowadays even Microsoft Word allows basic photo edition.

somequixotic

For an ongoing profit stream, they could charge for upgrades to new versions, like they already do.

@Ariane But Photoshop takes it to the next level, and it isn't exactly hard -- it's not that it takes an expert to understand how to use it; it just takes finding the right tool to do the job.

Most people aren't used to the concept that they would be able to use an extremely powerful tool, because said tools aren't normally available to them due to the price. If they were available, you better believe people would want them.

Ariane

And also, I think they're a bit close-minded. They mostly keep in mind their classic clientele - mac-using design/etc. studios who don,t see the problem with that pricing at all. And honestly they're reacting to their market very well. Now, why they don't try to attend a larger market... maybe they just don't feel the need to, and are comfortable that way. After all, they don't have much competition to make them move.

It's the same with a great number of popular companies actually. Just look at Intel, who routinely charges (for example) 30 % more for a processor that performs 10 % better than an AMD one.

Or Apple, who overprices their computers (even compared to pre-built PC vendors, and that's saying something) because they know they have their convinced, die-hard fan base who think they are paying the big extra for extra quality, when they in reality have a roughly equivalent product - or perhaps 5 % better because the aluminium body is tougher.

somequixotic

1:48 AM

Heh, yeah.

Difference being, with hardware, you're actually paying for significant natural resources to be spent on your behalf. Digging up rare earth elements, massive scale automation to fab the parts, and so on. Even if it's overpriced, it's still delivering an actual thing that they had to specifically make for you.

With software, it costs them maybe a dollar to transmit the software to you over the Internet, and the amortized cost of hosting a secure purchasing portal is probably around 25 cents per user if they have millions of users.

Add on another 90 dollars factoring in the development costs of authoring the software, and if you're selling tens or hundreds of millions of copies, that's a killing. You can sell support contracts separately for the large agencies that need 24/7 phone-in support, at thousands of additional dollars per year per company.

Ariane

Yes, but companies in a capitalist system, especially the US, don't reason with that logic. Even if they make 100 millions, if they can make 101 by doing something relatively immoral, they will.

And there's more. Several of them are actually happy and motivated by the fact of keeping "them", the lower human beings who don't have their money and social status, low, and giving them a little kick sometimes. If they want to come up to my level, may they work hard. No one's keeping them, after all, in the land of freedom, they'd say.

somequixotic

Instead, we needlessly funnel millions (or billions) of dollars to investors, corporate executives, and so on at Adobe, basically the gravy of the gravy of the gravy.

Journeyman Geek

oops

somequixotic

@Ariane I know all this, and I hate it. I wish it didn't have to be that way. I'm glad that at least some software is not that way. What if Google Chrome cost $1500? Thankfully it doesn't. And GNU/Linux is actually a very usable desktop operating system, even if you want to run Photoshop on top of it.

We're not all the way there yet, but we have a heck of a lot of really promising software licensed under a system whose ideals threaten the very existence of proprietary software. We just need more time and more effort to go into it. Maybe one day we can make all the dinosaurs extinct once again.

Now can you understand why I defend the law, and specifically copyright law? Without copyright law, this movement, this Free Software movement, would be powerless to continue to exist and to propagate itself. It's the copyleft provisions of Free Software licenses that are chiefly responsible for ensuring that Free Software continues to exist. Without them, some company would just take the code and monetize it and make it closed source, like Apple did with BSD to make Mac OS X.

Maybe I do agree that the law can be bent or broken in practice when the law is wrong. But I think copyright law is inherently correct; it's just being used in wrong ways. But it's also being used in extremely wonderful, right ways, and I don't want it to stop being used that way.

Journeyman Geek

@somequixotic: actually, I do believe the apple kernel source code is available

they have just been delaying it to slow down hackintoshery

somequixotic

1:58 AM

@JourneymanGeek It is, but you can't create a usable operating system out of it.

Journeyman Geek

its the userland-space thats closed source

and that was never BSD licenced

somequixotic

The whole userland is closed source except for the compiler.

Ariane

Lol, Google Chrome isn't worth paying for considering that there's an equivalent browser that's free and even open-source.

somequixotic

@Ariane What I meant is, if all browsers were extremely overpriced and similarly priced. Kinda like vendor collusion -- "if you charge $500, I'll charge $500, and we'll make a killing!"

Ariane

I know. Just had to make a comment because I dislike Chrome.

somequixotic

1:59 AM

heh

I like Chrome if for no other reason than the fact that it's based on Chromium, and the Chromium project has contributed a lot of great things to the Free and Open Source movement, such as enhancements to libraries it depends on; a standalone, super-fast, JIT native-compiling JavaScript engine (V8); and enhancements to WebKit that helped other browsers.

you could also argue that Chrome/Chromium helped Firefox indirectly by making Firefox strive to compete with the JavaScript performance of Chrome, by writing a new JavaScript engine for Firefox.

for a while there, Chrome's JS engine was many times faster than the closest competitor... but the developers of the other JS engines, upon realizing this, got a little jealous and decided to catch up.

the whole web owes them for that.

Ariane

Sure. though I highly dislike Chrome's interface, so.

Although arguably by default Firefox, nowadays, has part of the things I dislike about Chrome's interface. But mine is not by default, Har, har, har.

somequixotic

@Ariane you mean the orange Firefox button in the top left and no menu bar? :P

Ariane

@somequixotic Yes. And the disappearance of the status bar. And the joining of the stop/reload buttons. And the awkwardly placed button inside the URL bar, recently. And the tabs on top of the rest (which makes no sense at all). And probably more. I was pretty disappointed when I saw them go that route. Relieved when I saw most of those could be easily changed back without even needing an extension.

Luckily they didn't copy Chrome's settings style, sheesh.

somequixotic

►

Ariane

2:15 AM

@somequixotic The heck?

somequixotic

XD

Ariane

Also, funny how hard it is to make truly futuristic-looking equipment. That footage isn't even that old, yet their attempt at something futuristic just looks plain old from our perspective.

somequixotic

I love parodies/recuts of Star Trek. it's great.

Ariane

Star Trek has never really interested me. I'm not in the right generation for it to have caught me when it was "hot", and I'm not interested in science fiction enough to be digging things up. Heck, even recent science fiction movies, I won't watch them if they're science fiction.

However what I did love very much was this: Dans une galaxie près de chez vous (In a galaxy close to you), which was a comedy series about science fiction that was probably inspired by Star Trek and Star Wars and whatnot (though I wouldn't know), and was truly awesome. Too bad the series is only in French. There's a chance you'd love it. There were two movies made out of it several years later, though, and those I believe they at the very least have English subtitles.

Have a look, even though you're likely not to understand much. youtube.com/…

Journeyman Geek

2:34 AM

@somequixotic there's supposed to be a gnu project to make a replacement, but yanno how those go ;p

I think haiku is about the only attempt at a replacement FOSS OS thats remotely usable

(and they had a dev of the project they are trying to clone do their kernel for them, and a suprisingly high amount of help)

Bob

3:32 AM

Blah.

Gowtham

3:43 AM

@somequixotic Same thing happens in India

Ariane

3:59 AM

You know you have a sensitivity problem when a single post from an unknown faraway guy about how he was nice to a depressed woman makes you daydream about marrying him.

Psycogeek

4:51 AM

0

Q: Record key sequence on keyboard for play/pause

I have recently switched from a keyboard that has media buttons (Logitech) for play/pause to one instead with recordable macros (Poker 2). Are there alt-codes or any key sequence I can record to simulate these presses? EDIT: No Alt codes, I guess. There are volume keys, though, so it must implem...

What media program be it windows , linux or OSX even does not already have keyboard shortcuts available via the media program itself?

Journeyman Geek

5:02 AM

lol

user 99572 is fine

7:15 AM

@nhinkle I don't just remove them. Sometimes they are about servers, but more about Windows-Server, email server, Ubuntu-server, so it makes sense to retag instead of outright burninating. It would be cool if the tag would be banned from using, however. People keep using it. Grrr.

Psycogeek

7:44 AM

0

A: Custom toolbar location XP

There are 2 locations that make up the whole of the toolbars for XP. One is the positional data for the locations of the toolbars, and the icons order in the toolbars, which is in the location of the registry HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Streams\ The other ...

Help me reopen this , it was clear what the guy was talking about, just because nobody used toolbars in XP [·} is not his fault . And they went and tosssed toolbars in win7 :-(

Bob

@Psycogeek You can still have toolbars in Win7.

Psycogeek

@Bob not the same way. there was many people having a fit about them at windows "answers" forum.

Hennes

Morning.

Bob

@Psycogeek Not in the same way?

What way?

Hennes

Grah. I quickly, and without much attention, answer a ramdisk question

And I get a memory badge for it.

Sooo wrong.

Psycogeek

7:54 AM

@Bob Both sides and the top for example, with multiple seperators. I had to get a 3rd party tool to do them the same in win7

The deal is, i dont run around closing Linux threads because i dont know what Sudo is

thats just mean

@Hennes so you have now answered 100 questions wiki tagged with Memory?

Hennes

Nope. JUst about 1

At least 20 questions, at least 100 score

Psycogeek

well not to worry, someone will burniate it later :-)

Hennes

These two pictures seem to be responsible

I still get amazed that shitty written, quick, unresearched questions go semi viral

Psycogeek

ask a stupid question, get a lot of points, if it doesnt get closed

2

Q: My microwave kills the wifi

Everytime I start the microwave in the kitchen our home wifi stops working and all devices loose connection with our router! The kitchen and the wifi router are in opposite ends of the apartment but devices are being used a little here and there. We've been annoyed by the instability of the wifi ...

wireless-networking mode channel

Bob

What a beautiful question, love it! but not sure if it belongs here. My 2 cents are on electric signal fluctuation when microwave comes on, since it drains a lot of Amps and electronic gadgets, specially these routers are very very sensitive to that fluctuation and they reset. They reset even on a slow conversion UPS sometimes — Ø Hanky Panky Ø 5 mins ago

...

Psycogeek

8:05 AM

Aggg, microwave containment failure, run to nuke shelter :-)

Bob

This guy evidently has no clue.

I guess it's a somewhat decent guess.

Psycogeek

Microwaves use 2X the ammount of energy they output into food, or are listed as. so a 1100 watt, could suck down 2200W. But bog over the stove kinds i think are on 220V in the US.

Boris_yo

@Psycogeek You are familiar with I2P?

Psycogeek

His symptoms sound like a brownout condition , as can be caused by refer, toaster, air conditioners. and now we know he doesnt have a UPS.

Bob

@Psycogeek It's got nothing to do with power draw.

Rather, microwave ovens conveniently use approximately the same frequency as 2.4GHz WiFi.

Hennes

8:11 AM

Aye.

Psycogeek

@Bob I can stand right by mine with a 2.4 phone, and nothing changes.

Hennes

As do lots of other devices.

Over here (NL) the 2.4 GHZ band is freely available (with transmission power limited)

Which means everybody can use it, and that it is NOT guaranteed to work for wireless

Psycogeek

Mabey i will test it , by putting the phone in the microwave. sombody call me, when i turn it on.

Hennes

Next, clue in a council which wanted computer controlled trams, with the control via WiFI

Ah, good point about the two different radio set.

Psycogeek

@Bob i think your right ""There is an "internet connection" light on the router and it doesn't go out when the interruption occurs so I think this is only an internal wifi issue.""

Hennes

8:16 AM

Heh, yeah.

Psycogeek

I just tested the 2.4G phone right in front of an around the microwave here, and it doesnt make any change at all.

Bob

@Hennes That's fairly standard worldwide.

ISM bands.

Hennes

Aye. But that towns council seems to have missed the 'not guaranteed' part.

Though I guess it would be fun if you got on it and you could jam the controls so you did not have to get off while it was raining.

Bob

@Hennes Wait.

Critical systems controlled by WiFi?

Psycogeek

LOL double teamed that sucker

Bob

8:20 AM

Of all the unreliable tech...

Hennes

Yup

Psycogeek

""which you most definitely will feel before any real ". . . tumors form on your children from repetitive cell injury

Hennes

Mah

You are more likely to quickly cook your brain, thing "Is it hot" and faint.

Assuming you put your head Inside the microwave

Bob

EM (especially UV) from the sun is far more powerful and damaging (in the case of UV)

Hennes

And override the safety on the door

Bob

8:24 AM

UV is actually ionising at the higher frequency end

Hennes

1) Microwave 'sun tan protection'
2) Marketing
3) PROFIT!

Bob

and IR from the sun would probably cause more heating (and is higher frequency) than a slightly leaky microwave oven

@Hennes Oh god no. We have enough fearmongering over all kinds of radiation already.

Hennes

I'll fire up my neutrino wave and sell shielding for that!

Bob

Every time I say something about radiation leaking or interfering, I have to point out the fact that it's not gonna turn everyone into a mutant

Psycogeek

@Bob sure but microwaves cook from the inside out. That was a Feature they sold us on.

Bob

8:26 AM

@Psycogeek Uh, no.

No they don't.

That's a myth.

That's been repeatedly disproven.

Psycogeek

@Bob tell that to my potato

Hennes

potato potatoe :)

Bob

Microwave ovens heat by dielectric heating, on water.

i.e. it heats water

if your food has water on the inside, that will heat before a dry layer on the outside (which will heat by convection)

Ramchandra Apte

hehe my temporary suspension ended finally.

Journeyman Geek

oh, we can fix that

2

Gowtham

8:30 AM

lol

Bob

lol

Ramchandra Apte

hmm... it seemed like it would never end....

editing image as to avoid copyright violation

Journeyman Geek

@Psycogeek dupe!

lol

takes a while for that to propagate

why did you get suspended?

Ramchandra Apte

I can not tell that.

though succintly, it's because of TOS violation.

/away

Psycogeek

@JourneymanGeek Duped alright, he has been duped into thinking that stuff isnt getting out. and bob is using one under his bed to stay warm at night, cause its safer than the sun :-)

Bob

8:37 AM

@Hennes Turns out that if the microwave oven is precise enough with its output frequency, a low or high channel could avoid it entirely.

Psycogeek

heck the wiki is one contradiction after another (citation needed) on the depth of the heating . "Microwave radiation also penetrates deeper than direct heat, so that the food is heated by its own internal water content. In contrast, direct heat can fry the surface while the inside is still cold."

He was working on an active radar set when he noticed that a Mr. Goodbar he had in his pocket started to melt - the radar had melted his chocolate bar with microwaves. The first food to be deliberately cooked with Spencer's microwave was popcorn, and the second was an egg, which exploded in the face of one of the experimenters

--Another case of uneven heating can be observed in baked goods containing berries. In these items, the berries absorb more energy than the drier surrounding bread and cannot dissipate the heat due to the low thermal conductivity of the bread.

there is an example of it penetrating through , and exciting the water, "deeper".

Ramchandra Apte

8:55 AM

actually I should be suspended till March 28, 2014

Bob

@Psycogeek That's going through something that doesn't affect it (or get affected by it).

I mentioned that above.

Journeyman Geek

@RamchandraApte: want to post a meta post asking why?

Ramchandra Apte

?

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