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Living Room / Re: Is our perception of worth/value affected by venue?

« Last post by wraith808 on January 25, 2012, 07:48 PM »

Compare "apple products" sold in applestore and "windows products" sold in any random computer shop.
-mahesh2k (January 25, 2012, 07:42 PM)

I don't think that's a fair comparison. This is true art that one person in a million has the skill to develop and true artistry like none other. To compare that to popcorn technology is not quite an apt comparison in my opinion.

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Living Room / Re: Is our perception of worth/value affected by venue?

« Last post by wraith808 on January 25, 2012, 07:33 PM »

I just wonder how much I miss by not paying attention, especially noticing the exit interview. And I was very touched by the person that went to be out of his 'space' but still listen. Then after he had to move on, humbly gave the $5 tip. It was more those interviews that affected me more than the actual events in the subway.

It's sort of like walking through a forest to get somewhere, and never noticing the trees. It just saddened me for some reason.

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Living Room / Is our perception of worth/value affected by venue?

« Last post by wraith808 on January 25, 2012, 04:57 PM »

I just saw a picture and article posted by a friend about Joshua Bell, world reknowned violinist playing on the subway incognito, and for playing a set that he'd played for $100 a ticket in a concert hall, of some of the most intricately arranged classical pieces (though not popular tunes), on an instrument worth 3.5 million dollars, he received over the course of an hour $59, and was recognized only once. I thought this had to be a hoax, but did some research and found it to be true.

A Concert Violinist on the Metro?

Pearls Before Breakfast

I'm normally pretty observant, especially in regards to music and the arts. But I started to wonder... would I have really noticed? Is our perception of the relative beauty of art/music- and the worth of that skill and talent- affected so much by venue?

Something to think about...

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Living Room / Re: All-In-One Multi-Touch Computers - Thoughts?

« Last post by wraith808 on January 25, 2012, 02:15 PM »

Do you know anyone who has had to dig inside one of these AIO's?
-J-Mac (January 25, 2012, 01:08 PM)

I did. And SJ's experiences ring true. If anything, he's being nicer than my experiences. It's like a BMW in the fact that much of the engineering that has gone into making it pretty is also designed to keep people without the correct (i.e. manufacturer) tools out.

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Living Room / Re: As a counter-point to the SOPA/PIPA demonstration

« Last post by wraith808 on January 25, 2012, 02:06 PM »

What he says and what he does are two separate things that often contradict.
-Deozaan (January 25, 2012, 01:57 PM)

I think that's the way you (unfortunately) have to work in D.C. these days in order to get anything done.

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Living Room / Re: Google Ends Privacy

« Last post by wraith808 on January 25, 2012, 12:21 PM »

Ya know... The more privacy issues that crop up around this target advertising thing ... The more I realize that the 80s tampon commercials weren't nearly as annoying as I'd thought.
-Stoic Joker (January 25, 2012, 11:38 AM)

Actually, they were less annoying than the ones today. They stated their point, and you winced and it was over. The ones today, you can watch the whole commercial and have no idea of what you were watching until later it goes off while you're doing something else. And those delayed winces can happen at bad times...

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Living Room / Re: As a counter-point to the SOPA/PIPA demonstration

« Last post by wraith808 on January 24, 2012, 10:56 PM »

I will add... don't price it like its gold just because everyone else does... $:-\$

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Living Room / Re: As a counter-point to the SOPA/PIPA demonstration

« Last post by wraith808 on January 24, 2012, 04:17 PM »

Jonathan Coulton Destroys The Rationale Behind The Megaupload Seizure With A Single Tweet; Follows Up With Epic Blog Post

The tweet:

"Any other musicians notice that ever since they shut down MegaUpload, the money has just been POURING in?"

From the actual post:

Along with all the illegal stuff happening on MegaUpload was some amount of completely legal stuff. People used MegaUpload to send large files around. Some number of those files were personal files owned by the people sending them. I have no idea what the ratio was, and probably it would be impossible to figure that out with any certainty, but let's stipulate that it was a very large percentage of illegal activity, and only a very tiny percentage of the users were there for anything other than downloading content that they didn't buy. Still, today that tiny percentage had something taken away from them, without warning, maybe just a service they liked using, but maybe a piece of digital media that belonged to them - if they uploaded something and didn't keep a copy, that thing is now gone. Them's the breaks I guess, but in evaluating whether this shutdown was a net positive for us humans, you have to take that into account.
Even some of the illegal usage was likely the kind of activity that approaches what I consider to be victimless piracy: people downloading stuff they already bought but lost, people downloading stuff they missed on TV and couldn't find on Netflix or iTunes, people downloading stuff they didn't like and regretted watching or hearing and never would have bought anyway, people downloading a Jonathan Coulton album (oh let's say, Artificial Heart, the new Jonathan Coulton album, which is an awesome Jonathan Coulton album called Artificial Heart) and loving it so much that in a year they decide to buy a ticket to a Jonathan Coulton show and walk up to the merch table and hand me $20. I know not everyone will think all of those things are victimless crimes, and even I can admit that some of them maybe kinda sorta have victims, but my point is that you can't easily say that every illegal download is a lost sale, because it's a lot more complicated than that. So when you evaluate the "damage" that a site like MegaUpload is causing, you have to think about these things too. The grand jury indictment against them says they've caused $500 million in damages to copyright owners. Given the complexity of actual usage on a site like MegaUpload, how can they possibly know that?

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Living Room / Re: Apple & Textbooks

« Last post by wraith808 on January 23, 2012, 12:49 PM »

Report: Apple sees 350,000 textbook downloads within three days after iBooks 2 debut

The students are speaking, unfortunately... that $15 price tag is too good to ignore. Though this electronic textbook thing has been going on a while, the price point is what makes this attractive. My wife had to pay the same amount as a textbook through her college for access to an electronic one- that was worse than anything Apple has done here IMO. And by the forerunners being so greedy (vitalsource bookshelf was the one her college used), they've opened the way for Apple's more 'reasoned' approach- even if it will be worse in the long run.

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Living Room / Re: As a counter-point to the SOPA/PIPA demonstration

« Last post by wraith808 on January 23, 2012, 12:25 PM »

Three related stories from TechDirt

Busta Rhymes Backs Megaupload, Says Record Labels Are The Real Criminals

From the article:

There's a key point in all of this that we missed in our earlier analysis about paid accounts at Megaupload. In the indictment, the government seems to assume that paid accounts are clearly all about illegal infringing works. But that's not always the case. In fact, plenty of big name artists -- especially in the hip hop world -- use the paid accounts to make themselves money. This is how they release tracks. You sign up for a paid account from services like Megaupload, which pay you if you get a ton of downloads. For big name artists, that's easy: of course you get a ton of downloads. So it's a great business model for artists: they get paid and their fans get music for free. Everyone wins. Oh... except for the old gatekeeper labels.

Dan Bull Raps about how Megaupload Takedown Screws Indie Artists Like Him

From the article:

My favorite line? "Make money giving away things for free? Ah! Why can't the majors do similarly?" It's a key point. As we explained on Friday, tons of artists have figured out that Megaupload and similar sites are a fantastic new business model, but they're a business model that the major labels hate... so they work double-time to make it look like some evil conspiracy.

And even the alternatives are disappearing:

Megaupload Shutdown means other companies turning off useful services

From the article:

RIAA supporters are cheering this on -- believing that all of these services really focused on infringing content. But for the many, many artists, companies and individuals who used them legitimately, this is pretty troubling. Useful services are being shut down due to an overreaction on the part of the US government.

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Living Room / Re: Ripped off as an employee? "Free food" + the employment contract.

« Last post by wraith808 on January 22, 2012, 06:37 PM »

What is wrong with people?
-app103 (January 22, 2012, 06:00 PM)

One word. Farmville. (and other games like it)

That's what's wrong with people LOL

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Living Room / Re: As a counter-point to the SOPA/PIPA demonstration

« Last post by wraith808 on January 22, 2012, 06:35 PM »

On the other hand MegaUpload and similar sites are profiting by distributing other peoples works. Once you make money, you're no longer sharing, and you deserve to be stopped.
-Eóin (January 22, 2012, 05:10 PM)

Ummm... no. They're profiting by giving space and bandwidth to people to share whatever they want. They aren't distributing anything.

For instance... I have a friend that does his own music. He used megaupload to store backups of works in progress, and allow others to get them. His backups are gone now. (He still has them, and can use another service... but still...)

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Official Announcements / Re: DC going offline to protest SOPA on Jan 18

« Last post by wraith808 on January 22, 2012, 06:31 PM »

I don't particularly like being bossed around. Especially by idiots in public office.
-40hz (January 22, 2012, 01:49 PM)

And we go full circle.

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Official Announcements / Re: DC going offline to protest SOPA on Jan 18

« Last post by wraith808 on January 22, 2012, 01:19 PM »

There are actually municipalities in the US that require gun ownership now. I don't think there have been studies as to what effect that has had on crime, though.

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Living Room / Re: Ripped off as an employee? "Free food" + the employment contract.

« Last post by wraith808 on January 22, 2012, 01:16 PM »

And in less than 6 weeks, you'll have enough extra to buy yourself a microwave for your office, and another 6 weeks after that to afford your own mini-fridge, both of which you get to keep (or sell to another employee) when you terminate your employment.
-app103 (January 22, 2012, 12:57 PM)

(If you are allowed to do so...)

"Be willing to walk away" is an absolute rule for negotiation though
-IainB (January 22, 2012, 08:14 AM)

Yes, but many people get it in negotiations as a 'tactic', not a rule. When I say walk away, it means walk away and don't look back. I've learned the hard way, that once an employer and you cannot come to an agreement without the walk-away, that relationship is poisoned. In reality, they didn't think you were worth the amount. Hard bargaining is a lie, especially when it comes to skills. And people that bargain that way don't value what they've bargained for.

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Living Room / Re: Community outsourcing... Awesome idea

« Last post by wraith808 on January 22, 2012, 06:35 AM »

One thing to be wary of is payment and terms, especially in regards to work done, and your alternatives. Pay close attention to how it's done, and if possible, contact someone who has done work on the site to see how it is. Been there, done that, gotten burned before.

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Living Room / Re: Ripped off as a Google employee? "Free food" + the employment contract.

« Last post by wraith808 on January 22, 2012, 06:33 AM »

You have to also be willing to walk away. If you aren't, then no amount of tactics will help. I've taken perks and gone for the money. And in going for the money, in most cases, I've had to walk away. Not just fake it and hope they get to me before the door, but walk away and say "no thanks" and mean it. Because once you've gone that far, and then they come back and give you more (done this before too) then you've basically shown your colors and sold out for money. And nothing's the same afterwards. If they aren't willing to offer you want you want at the table, then they don't think you're worth it. And anything afterwards is just lies to get around it.

The one other thing I will say about perks- they don't keep up with the cost of living like cold hard cash. If you get 10% of what you would have gotten in perks or bonuses, you will be short when time comes for salary increases, because those are based on your salary in most cases, not the bonuses you have made in the past.

Salary negotiation is a fine art, and even going in knowing all of the games they play and the lies that they spin and your own rights, you can still come out behind, because it *is* an art. And you *can* lose the skills (been there done that) through lack of use and/or your relative need for a position.

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