Cav's Place

Several months ago, a nice post was written by a Green Options blogger, supporting purchasing music on-line strictly for environmental reasons. I will take this further, also including software and movies and other reasons for which buying such things on disks should be dropped in favor of other means, means which wouldn’t even require servers to be kept running non-stop. Greedy distributors certainly won’t have any of this, but maybe someday greed will stop ruling our world. One can dream, right?
I have written what I think about software piracy and how programs should be marketed to make it fairer and more affordable for all before, even added another idea to that topic later, but now I mean to go into more detail. If you read those posts you’ll notice I’m repeating myself a lot in this one, but you can’t go into detail without explaining where you’re coming from.

Looking at it from the environmental point of view, it’s perfectly obvious that buying software, music or movies on disks is very harmful. You have resources used and pollution caused by the production process, as well as materials that will, sooner or later, end up in a landfill. And that’s just for the product itself, but you have to keep in mind that an entire system is set into motion to distribute that product. Materials and products alike must be shipped from place to place, which once again uses resources and causes pollution, not to mention requires a certain infrastructure which can only be created by scarring the environment. On top of that, storehouses and shops are required to store and sell those products, taking up space, using more resources and causing more pollution.
On the other hand, as that Green Options blogger pointed out, the sale of digital versions is not without its own environmental costs. They are significantly smaller than those of the disks, but they certainly exist and we should aim towards eliminating them as much as possible. Why keep servers running non-stop to store and make available all the things people might want to purchase, with all the added environmental costs of that, when there is another way?

Next, let’s look at matters from a financial point of view. Manufacturing the disks, boxes, manuals, guides and all other things that may come with software, music or movies certainly costs money. Then you have the costs associated with shipping, rent for the space used for both storage and sales, the necessary furnishings and equipment for those locations and salaries paid to the people handling it all. This system also requires distributors, multiple layers of them actually, and they take a very large share of the profits despite not being involved in creating the product. Or not involved in any good way at least, since they often get in the way and make the creators basically ruin their work in one way or another for “marketing reasons”.
Digital sales, the way the concept is currently understood, also come with their own financial costs. Those servers aren’t cheap and neither is the power required to run them. You also need a specialized team to ensure they’re operational at all times and fix any problems that might arise as soon as possible, not to mention the costs associated with the actual space they occupy, including the necessary furnishings and additional equipment. On top of that, the bandwidth used by the customers when they’re downloading their purchases also needs to be paid for. This model could perhaps avoid the need for distributors, but it requires an initial investment which many might not be able to cover from their own pockets. Large content producers could afford it, Radiohead’s case being the best known recently, but for the smaller ones it would be a hard path to take.
Also, both of these methods have another kind of added costs. They use copy-protection technology, which certainly costs money to develop and implement, but which will always be cracked by those who are determined enough. It’s simply a waste, and not only from a financial point of view.

When it comes to ease of purchasing and use, disks are once again at a disadvantage. It’s certainly far easier to download something from a file-sharing network than it is to go and buy it. In order to buy it, you need to search for a shop that has it in their offer, make an order and wait for delivery. You may also find that the product you’re looking for is no longer in stock and you need to either wait or look for another shop. Such a purchase also requires direct contact with other people, which is a problem for those who are shy, and you may also need to adjust your schedule in order to be available when the shop is open or when the delivery can be made.
Digital versions fare much better from this point of view, since the products can never be out of stock, the purchase may be made without any direct contact with another person and the customer is usually able to enjoy the product immediately, without needing to go out or wait for delivery. Still, purchasing a product without any interaction usually requires a credit card and that is a problem for some. Also, the need to search for a shop that has the product you’re looking for, or for the producer’s site in case distributors are left out of it, is not eliminated, plus that if those sites have technical problems there could be delays. Downloading a product from such a site is also likely to take longer than from a file-sharing network.
As for the copy-protection methods, those are probably the worst problem when it comes to ease of use. They limit the devices you may store the products on and the ways in which you may use them, they make the first use more complicated by requiring registration or entering certain information, they may cause compatibility issues or even make a legitimate buyer no longer able to use their legally purchased product… As I keep saying, those who wish to get around them will always do so, but legitimate users keep being hindered by them.

My solution to all of this is to sell only the right to use the product, not the actual copy. Get rid of all copy-protection measures, let people obtain their copies of the products either way they see fit and then only pay for the right to use them legally. Of course, some might still want disks, boxes, manuals and so on, but they will have to pay a lot more for them and this will act as a deterrent, which is a good thing for the environment. But I’m quite sure that all other potential customers would be very happy if this would happen. They would be able to legally use their software, music and movies without any of the problems associated with purchases right now and also pay significantly less. Or they would pay significantly less if the content producers wouldn’t get greedy and only ask as much as they would have made from the sale of the product on a disk, after deducting all the costs associated with manufacturing and distributing said package.
Distribution would be handled by file-sharing networks, after the content producers would initially make it available from their own computers. That eliminates the entire production and shipping chain, including the distributors, meaning that all revenue would go directly to the content producers, who are the ones who are really entitled to it. And if they would stop being greedy and set the price in such a way as to reflect the elimination of all those additional costs, the product would end up costing only a fraction of what it costs now and that will certainly make far more people want to buy it.
Making such products available would no longer be a crime in any way, as you wouldn’t need to have a license to use them if you only store them and make them available for download. This would most easily be implemented for software, as purchasing the right to use it could mean you get a code that you have to enter in order to be able to run the program, meaning that if you don’t actually use it you have no need for the code and therefore no need to purchase it. Of course anybody could make valid codes public and there would be no need for purchase, but that’s being done anyway and, as I keep saying, methods of protection are only effective in hindering legitimate users.
There would also need to be very convenient means of making this purchase, and I can think of several. For those who have credit (or debit) cards and wish to use them, the easiest way would be to be able to buy the right to use the product directly from the content producer’s site. Still, other methods of payment would have to be available for everyone else, and those could include checks and direct money transfers from various sources, but there should also be a way to pay by SMS. Some small additional fees might be added depending on the method used to make the payment, such as the credit card handling fee or the communications operator’s SMS charges, and those should be clearly specified so people would know exactly how much they’re actually paying for the product itself.

Many people will say that eliminating all protection and legalizing the free distribution of copyrighted content will make even less people actually purchase it, but that’s the distributors’ brainwashing doing the talking. So-called “piracy” does not lower sales! Even now people who wish to purchase such content do so and those who don’t still won’t either way. Making such content harder to “pirate” will not increase sales, it will only make fewer people be able to enjoy it. I think we don’t need to pointlessly take away things that people enjoy, there are few enough reasons for happiness in this world as it is.
There is also the issue of eliminating an entire industry, namely the content distributors. If you think about it, they wouldn’t be entirely eliminated, as some people would still desire to own copies and all the other things that come with them, but they would end up catering mainly to a niche audience. That would make them far less important and certainly far less wealthy, which is something I have absolutely no problem with.
Instead, what this would do would be making such products far more affordable and easier to purchase and use legally (and adding a direct renting system, where you purchase usage rights for a limited amount of time for an even smaller price, would make it even better). That would certainly translate into many more buyers, not less, and with distribution costs out of the way that means greater profits for the content creators, who would then truly benefit from the results of their work instead of being at the mercy of their distributors more often than not as the case is now. That means both the creators and the users would benefit greatly, and they are the two groups that matter when it comes to this.
In addition, something like this would virtually eliminate the real piracy, and by that I mean those who earn money by selling products they did not create. That’s something I’m firmly against, making a profit from somebody else’s work, and it’s one of the reasons I’m so against distributors as well. Yes, I see distributors and actual copyright pirates as being quite similar and would like it if people would fight against them both equally.

And all of this still assumes that some payment should be required in order to legally use copyrighted content in a non-commercial manner. When it comes to software that does seem logical, seeing as software developers have no other means of income, but even there there should be different tariffs for commercial and non-commercial use where applicable, not to mention that open-source options are becoming better and better when it comes to productivity software.
On the other hand, musicians and movie makers have other means of income and I firmly believe those should be their main ones. Musicians have concerts and also earn something when their songs are played on commercial radio or TV stations, movies earn money by being played in theaters for those who wish to watch them there and also by being aired on TV, and both would still be able to earn something from the people who want to own actual copies on disks and all the other things that come with them. Those should add up to more than enough to cover their expenses and even make a nice profit if they’re good enough at what they do, so there should be no more need to charge people for the content they have on their computers and portable media players.
That said, it would be a nice thing to legally allow such content to be used in a non-commercial manner free of charge, only allowing people to donate something to the content producers if they wish to do so, as a recognition of their merits. It’s been proven to work already…

This post was originally meant to be just a brief comment about the impact of The Da Vinci Code, the reaction religious authorities had to it and how that made it even more believable, though the author originally said it’s just a work of fiction. Then Zeitgeist was noticed by the media and they ended up focusing almost entirely on its first part and vehemently criticizing it for that while almost completely ignoring the rest of it. That made me want to write something about how any perceived attack on Christianity is taken by the general public in the countries where it’s the majority religion and how that reaction may make an external viewer even more likely to think there’s a dark secret to hide. But as time passed and I never got around to writing that either, I decided to focus on one of the potentially darkest secrets of all religions: What would you find if you’d go back far enough?

It’s no secret that most religions have things in common and similar myths and legends. That’s especially true for those who have succeeded each other in a certain area or social group, in fact in this case some of the myths and legends can be said to be identical, only the names being changed and the story retold in such a way as to appear to support the teachings of the new religion. I’m not going to give examples, if you’re interested I assume you already know several such cases and you can do your own research anyway.
Starting from that, it’s not difficult to reach the conclusion that there is a common source from which all those stories have been adapted. That should make people with different religious views more tolerant of each other, but of course those who are unwilling to be tolerant won’t be and instead they’ll use that fact as one more “bullet” against everyone else, saying their religion is the “true” one and all others are inspired from it. Of course, anybody who actually thinks for just a second will realize that such a conclusion is most likely to mean that no religion is the “true” one, each having been inspired by stories told at the time it was founded, seen from a new perspective and perhaps connected with certain other events that might have actually happened at the time. That realization should make everyone think things more thoroughly and become more willing to discuss their beliefs with others, in hopes of figuring out some more pieces of the Truth.

But if you ride that train of thought a little further you have to wonder what you could find if you’d go back far enough. Yes, they do seem to have common sources, but are they real? Are we talking about real events that actually happened and then have been retold and used for various purposes through the ages or are we talking about misunderstood natural phenomena that have mistakenly been given a mystical significance? Or, worst of all, are we talking about stories invented by somebody many thousands of years ago for the sole purpose of controlling others, stories so effective that they still work to this day, and perhaps so effective that even those who use them to control others these days believe them themselves?
If you could go back far enough, how dark would the secrets you’d uncover be? How frightening? How disheartening? Knowing that possibility and assuming you could go back and find out, would you be willing to do it? I’m not asking militant atheists, those would certainly be more than willing, just like I’m not asking those who are determined to believe in something no matter what, those would certainly be completely unwilling, I’m asking everyone who considers themselves to be open-minded when it comes to this issue while still believing in something. Scary prospect, isn’t it? But food for thought…

I don’t know how I’d answer that question, to be honest. And I’m saying that even though my beliefs rely more on different states of energy and the existence of highly evolved entities than myth and legend, plus that I do find myself often wondering what if there’s nothing really there… I guess I can sometimes be serious about my beliefs and somewhat agnostic at the same time. Yet even though I know it’s highly unlikely for any of the current religious views, including my own, to really be correct, even though my own beliefs wouldn’t be shattered by the revelation that these myths and legends aren’t based on real events at all, or they’re based on mundane events which have been misunderstood at the time, and even though I do sometimes take into consideration the possibility that there’s nothing beyond the physical realm, I’d still be edgy if given a hypothetical chance to find out the real sources.
Truth be told, we all need to believe in something and I’m no exception. Yes, for some of us that need to believe translates into the idea that there’s nothing to believe in, but that’s just a belief like any other. The only question is what do we do with that belief…
Personally, I’d rather stick to the idea that any religious belief that’s imposed on others or claims to be the “one true religion” is wrong, but any that stays at a personal level can be as close or as far from the Truth as any other or none at all. What worries me are all the people who don’t see it that way and would want everyone to believe as they do, those who wouldn’t accept any evidence that they’re wrong even if it’d stare them right in the face…

Last night was the first night I slept back in my room, after 24 in “exile“. I only have the bed and the desk so far, but it’ll do, as much as anything can do since I lost everything that kept me here in the first place…

I was saying the bed is just what I wanted and it mostly is, but it does have a small problem that makes it make noises in exactly the wrong spot. In any other area I can even jump on it and it won’t complain in any way, but on the top half of the “free” side, so the area where I get on and off it and also where my arms are when I do pushups on it, there seems to be a problem with something and when the weight changes it “snaps”. I guess we’ll just turn it around and the problem will be solved, since there’s nothing to say where the head should be yet.
The major problem with the desk has been solved though, that drawer has been shortened so my UPS can go in behind it and out of sight. There’s no room to put a board above that place to protect it from anything that might fall from the drawers since he didn’t do it according to my plan, of course, but we’ll see… Also, the drawer still doesn’t come out easily, which makes even getting anything in and out of it a problem since, because it’s so short and it won’t be allowed to slide all the way out unless you pull it up first, the area that you have access to when you slide it out normally is only six and a half centimeters long. But I’ll make due with it I guess, better than nothing…
Another issue is that now the window takes a good shove to close. I asked dad what’s up with that and he said he noticed and thinks they put it back in at the wrong angle and it bent, so now he tried to put it at a slightly opposite angle hoping it’ll straighten itself out in time. There goes the insulation it was supposed to provide I guess, which is the very reason he changed them in the first place against my firm opposition and caused this entire mess with the mold… But it’s weird, because he said they didn’t take the windows out. Somebody’s lying about something…

Otherwise, it’s dirty and I can’t even vacuum now. The part that holds together the flexible and the hard parts of the hose broke and it can’t be put back together. Dad said we’ll just have to use it like that for the time being, just pointing the hose to where we want to clean, but what the fuck? How can you expect to clean a room like that? Ok, there’s no carpet here yet so I don’t need a brush, but still…
On the other hand, the way things are piled up does make it look even worse than it is. The books are in piles on the floor, my clothes are piled up on the desk next to the monitor, there’s a box somewhere in a corner and there are still some things I didn’t get back in here yet. I don’t plan to get those back until I’ll have the shelves as well.

The plan is now to look for things on my own on Thursday. I should be able to link a few things together, check out the book fair and then look through the three major furniture stores, if I won’t get too confused with the directions and if I’ll be able to hold it together around all those people for so long, which is a very big if. But I hope I’ll manage to get the exact idea and then be able to tell dad exactly what to get when he’ll have the time and money for it, which I hope will be very soon.

But, leaving all that, at least I’m back here. Though basically the only thing left untouched in this room since she was last here is the door… There is really nothing more I can say about that, few things were left and even fewer remain. Time doesn’t heal, time only kills…

I already knew about this when I last wrote about the idiotic things that pass for morality, but there was no way to fit it in. I’m talking about the Manchester Museum supposedly taking into account the complaints of a “significant minority” of visitors and covering up mummies, because those visitors were offended by the display and considered it undignified for the mummies. They seem to still be accepting comments on the official blog post about this issue, but they have covered them before asking for such comments.
Need I say I’m baffled? I keep saying this lately, but this world we live in can only shock anybody who is still determined to think we’re in any way inclined to attempt proving that intelligence that we accuse ourselves of possessing. People use their supposed “morals” to justify so many idiotic things and this certainly isn’t new, it’s been done since somebody “invented” the concept.

I have to wonder what’s there to see in a covered mummy? What’s the point of keeping them on display at all? How can a museum, which is supposed to offer people the chance to see as much as possible, condone something like this?
But the real issue is another: Close-minded people insist on imposing their views on everyone else. And they do that because they can, because they’re allowed to. So the real question is why, why are they allowed to do this?

The way I see it, the issue is very simple. If you are bothered by seeing a naked mummy, you should not go to the area where they’re exhibited. Of course, the museum would have to arrange their exhibits in such a way that a person who would be bothered by passing through the area where the mummies are would not be required to do so in order to see something else. That’s simply common sense and it takes into account a lot more than the “nakedness” of the mummies. After all, quite a lot of people could be bothered by the sight of a dead body in that state, whether it’s naked or not.
But what’s being done is not reasonable in any way. We’re not talking about a minority’s right to protect themselves so they won’t be required to see what they don’t want to see, we’re talking about some people forcing others to bend to their will. It’s not a question of majority or minority, it’s simply a question of freedom. They should have the right not to see those naked mummies and the rest should have the right to see them as they are, simple as that. I don’t know how the museum is organized, but the only thing that’s required is not needing to pass through that area in order to reach another.

There is another aspect to this, though. Some of those complaints have argued that displaying the mummies in such a way is “undignified” for those people. If you take it from that point of view, some may think the complaints justified, but we’re talking about those with strange views. And no, the fact that they’re common doesn’t make them less strange.
Medicine is based on studying the human body, skeletons analyzed, necropsies performed, and let’s not forget about the virtual human body models that accurately represent their real models. If any such display is wrong, then they all are and medicine would still be in the stone age! Not to mention that if the display of a human body is wrong, then whether it’s covered in bandages or not makes little difference.
For the display of the body to be an offense to the deceased person’s dignity, that person would have to still be connected to that body, be aware of what’s being done to it. So the question is quite simple: Do any of those who complain about this have strong personal views that support the idea that a person’s soul (since it’s the only thing that would survive the death of the body and still be aware, which is a requirement in order to be offended) stays connected to the body even after death? And we’re talking about a very long time after death, thousands of years!

That’s really all there is to say about this… But since I’m on the topic of morality and have mentioned my previous post on this issue, I want to say I’m glad that the whole “nurses posing next to patient” scandal has been sorted in the reasonable manner. They have finally tracked the man down and asked him if he’s bothered by it. He said he isn’t and that he actually talked about this with those nurses before going into surgery. He also said that he intends to sue the tabloid that brought up the issue. So there will be no further action taken against those nurses, though investigators said they still somewhat reproach one of them because she had pictures taken of herself alone next to the patient’s bed, not as a group. But the fact remains that they were pressured into resigning initially and will have to find a job in another hospital now. The good news is that it seems they already have offers.

Three weeks ago I was saying I’m exiled to another room while work is being done in mine. The work itself was over in about ten days, but since everything needed to be replaced the room couldn’t be used so far. Now things are coming in and it would seem that I’ll finally be back there.
I have a bed I like, or at least I think I like since I’ll need to sleep in it first to be sure. There is something on the floor that I specifically didn’t want, but it was shoved down my throat and of course I have no say in the matter. And there’s a computer desk that was built exactly according to my sketch in every detail except the one that made me need to have it custom-made in the first place, which the carpenter just ignored, so it’s perfectly useless for my purposes.
Otherwise the room is bare and I plan to keep it that way until I can get exactly what I want. I’d much rather do without things for a while and then have what I want than have to stay with something that’s not quite right. Not like I need many things anyway… And I’m forced to do without the one I truly need…