Constants ([info]constants) wrote in [info]ann_arbor_ypsi,
@ 2004-01-15 21:09:00
Previous Entry  Add to memories!  Tell a Friend!  Next Entry
Current music:Death Cab For Cutie - We Looked Like Giants

To those who download... Crossposted.
Okay, so at the local school(Milan High School), a teacher had to resign. Why? Because somehow a anti-piracy group got tipped off to the school. MHS is a very small school as is.... let alone needing someone to resign. Why Did a staff member have to resign? Because they had downloaded bearshare, and over the network, many other people have downloaded over 6000$ worth of software, namely microsoft programs, who might I add get their fair share of money. The FBI came to the school, and took the computers.

A shame what we might have to experience just because we want to listen to music, or word process things.
I came across a great program that helps stop anti piracy groups from scanning your computers, called Peer Gaurdian. if you download alot via p2p or torrent, I suggest you download it.

http://xs.tech.nu/

That is all, take care everyone.
xo//Constantine.


(Post a new comment)


[info]novapsyche
2004-01-15 07:41 pm UTC (link)
The FBI was involved? And took computers? That's kind of punishing the rest of the students, since they won't be able to learn how to use the computers.

(Reply to this)


[info]notmyworld
2004-01-15 09:08 pm UTC (link)
Ah, the ol' alma mater is at it again in the news. Look - software piracy is illegal, period. Whoever this teacher was should be fired, or MHS should have a techie on staff to take care of the computers and make sure that p2p software isn't installed on any of the student's PCs. It's their responsibility to educate responsibly, and not to allow students to break the law using their equipment. They got what they deserved.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]revgeorge
2004-01-16 05:49 am UTC (link)
They got what they deserved? Did the rest of the students get what they deserved because someone infringed on someone else's copyright? Now that the computers have been confiscated the students won't be able to use them for the curriculum, they deserved that? And judging from past incidents, by the time the computers are returned they will be unusable (due to age) so the taxpayers will have to shell out extra money to buy the district new computers. Did they deserve that?

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]notmyworld
2004-01-16 10:00 am UTC (link)
The law is the law. If MHS had instructed it's teacher to check for p2p software, or had a computer tech on staff like it should have, then this never should have happened. Milan has a bad track record of not knowing what it's doing, especially when it comes to it's school system. This is another example of that.

If the parents of the kids see things the way you (and I) do, that the children are being deprived from educational resources, then perhaps they would be wise to bring that up in the next school board meeting.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]flanged
2004-01-16 10:14 am UTC (link)
Because the FBI is known for bowing to PTSO pressure.

No, the problem is not that the teacher is in trouble - the problem is that the FBI didn't recognize the absurdity of seizing all of a school's computer over the acts of one teacher.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

[info]revgeorge
2004-01-16 10:55 am UTC (link)
I'll agree that the law is the law, but that doesn't mean that the punishment (or even the law) is right. We've given corporations their own laws to enforce with the DMCA, and they're doing it. It sucks that this school was caught in the crossfire.

In a weblog post I suggested that the solution to this problem is not piracy copyright infringement but rather to use open source software. Why would any school district want to do business with companies that treated them that way? It's possible to live without Microsoft.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]notmyworld
2004-01-16 11:15 am UTC (link)
Hey - no argument here about using open source in schools, but you're really talking about a large undertaking here. The staffing and educational costs of going open source are immense. How many educators do you think are qualified enough to show students (many of who have never even touched a computer) how to use (let's say) Debian's apt-get to install packages, or (let's say) how to install hardware drivers in (let's say) KDE, or how to format a multi-sheeted spreadsheet in (let's say) Open Office.

And even if they were able to educate students on these open source products, is this really a good idea? The job world is still 99% M$. That means that they wouldn't be able to take a great deal of their training with them into the job world, or on to college. Is this really a good idea?

I love linux, xfree86, and open office as much as the next geek. I just don't think that it's a practical solution at this point. Maybe when linux takes a stronger hold of the corporate desktop (IBM is rumored to be switching all it's corporate workstations over by '05). Until then, the schools -- like us poor geeks -- are stuck with M$ for at least some stuff. Sucks.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]revgeorge
2004-01-16 11:22 am UTC (link)
I don't think that Linux is ready for the average desktop (although Linus predicts that this is the year for it), and I understand that there are costs with any undertaking. At the same time, there are steps that can be made.

OpenOffice.org can run under Windows, which seems like a good initial compromise to me. Most of the people who use Word these days learned on WordPerfect, WordStar, or a host of other DOS based word processors. I would think that it would be easy enough to move from OpenOffice.org's Writer to MS Word, considering that they're pretty close UI-wise.

Also, I don't advocate throwing out those 200 Office 2003 licenses that a school just bought. When upgrade time comes, though, open source software should be considered as a valid alternative.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]notmyworld
2004-01-16 11:31 am UTC (link)
I think it would be a great idea. Linus, unfortunately, is wrong. But that doesn't mean that there won't be strides made in that area during this year.

Openoffice for windows is a good idea, but it's just a stop-gap solution, or so it seems. MS makes it so cheap to purchase office for educational outlets that it's still probably cheaper to use their software than to use openoffice and find educators that are qualified enough to educate in it.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]pfrank
2004-01-16 04:33 pm UTC (link)
Linux may not be ready for the business or home users desktop, but I rather think it's perfect for an educational desktop. I've learned more about how my computer works since I started using Linux than I did in years upon years of poking around with other stuff.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

[info]chuckdamage
2004-01-16 04:00 am UTC (link)
Thanks for the heads up. The messed up thing about microsoft is that maybe if they didn't price their programs at such high prices, maybe more people would buy them rather than share them.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]qmrf
2004-01-16 06:13 am UTC (link)
Not that I think that, in this or in most cases, the anti-piracy punishment fits the crime, but it *is* a crime. Microsoft has every right to sell their own damn software and set whatever price they think is reasonable.

The rest of us then have the right, not to steal Microsoft's shoddy and overpriced crap but to install Linux and OpenOffice. Let's exhaust the means available to us within the law before we look at stepping over the line--sometimes it's just not necessary to break the law to make a difference, and, in those cases, it's much less painful to stay on the side of legality.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
The Old Robin Hood argument
[info]crankyasanoldma
2004-01-16 07:23 am UTC (link)
Absolutely. I get quite tired of the argument that stealing from big computer companies isn't that bad because they get so much money anyway.

Up until this year, my husband got royalties from a product sold by a large well-known company. Sure, you might see the brand and look at the pricetag and think, well, those fat cats and their shareholders don't need the money, and why the hell is this so expensive anyway? But I'm here to tell you there are eight people who worked on the original code, and they got paid on every sale. They did not get paid for every pirated copy or ripped-off download. And we're not talking about eight Bill Gates types. We're talking regular people. Some years, royalties have been a substantial portion of our family income.

I'm sad that a school lost resources over this--I'm not sure how I feel about how this was handled. But the argument that the software companies didn't need or deserve the money falls on pretty deaf ears in our household.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
Re: The Old Robin Hood argument
[info]pfrank
2004-01-16 04:36 pm UTC (link)
Sure copyright infringement is wrong and illegal, but I get tired of people equating it with theft. Yes it is wrong, but is not the same, nor should it have the same punishments, as theft.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
Re: The Old Robin Hood argument
[info]crankyasanoldma
2004-01-16 10:47 pm UTC (link)
I guess I hadn't thought of it as copyright infringement. I think of it as theft of intellectual property.

But that pretty quickly lays out our differences--I'm not trying to start an argument over it; we just see this differently.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
Re: The Old Robin Hood argument
[info]revgeorge
2004-01-17 10:50 am UTC (link)
One of the problems with that comparison is that theft denies someone of something, whereas copyright infringement denies the copyright holder of a potential sale. When copyrights were initially created, they were created as a balance between the public's need for a diverse set of works and a creators need for compensation. Unfortunately, companies like Disney have shifted that balance very far away from the public (see Eldred vs. Ashcroft). Copying a 14 year old song would be perfectly reasonable to the framers of the constitution, but now grandmothers are being harassed by corporations because of it.

I'm not against people getting paid for their work (like your husband, I think I read) but I don't think it's a cut and dried, simple issue.

If you're interested in the differing opinion, you should check out The Future of Ideas by Lawrence Lessig

(Reply to this) (Parent)

[info]notmyworld
2004-01-16 11:19 am UTC (link)
Heh - see above.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

[info]madush69
2004-01-16 07:34 am UTC (link)
When did this occur? Can you refer me to an article? This is something I'd like to read about.

(Reply to this)


[info]revgeorge
2004-01-16 11:12 am UTC (link)
I just spoke to Superintendent Dennis McComb at the school and he said that they had not been visited by anyone from the FBI and that no computers had been seized.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]notmyworld
2004-01-16 11:18 am UTC (link)
hahaha... okay that's pretty funny... at least it led to some pretty interesting conversation in this community.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]nerdtech
2004-01-16 11:35 am UTC (link)
Not really. Some people take issues of digital privacy and law pretty seriously, since it affects our day-to-day lives...

If this was a "joke" calling of "wolf" - this sucks. :(

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]notmyworld
2004-01-16 05:34 pm UTC (link)
lighten up, home skillet.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]nerdtech
2004-01-17 07:08 am UTC (link)
This IS a serious issue, all issues aside, suckah.

And by the way... yo' momma. :)

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]notmyworld
2004-01-17 08:46 am UTC (link)
Yes, it's serious. The fact that someone falsely reported the FBI coming into a high school and confiscating all of the comptuters was kinda funny though. It's like - how can you misreport something like that?

(Reply to this) (Parent)

[info]constants
2004-01-17 01:56 pm UTC (link)
novapsyche: Yes there was confiscation of computers. And to whoever spoke to the superintendent, you spoke with the wrong person. The person who sent the email out was the jackass of a tech adminstrator. He said everything that I posted about, which was summarized. they WERE contacted by the government.
You shouldn't call anyone's bluff if you don't know the situation.

also, whoever asked for an article, there was no article, it happened here.

Xoxo,
Constance

PS. I guess this post should be left to whoever wants to believe what, but none the less, it wasn't meant to inform you about the school, it was meant to alert and inform those of you who are active downloaders.

If you'd like to persecute me further, please do so in IM, I tend not to deal with LJ on older posts, for their servers are too slow for me to fool around with.

(Reply to this)

I feel your pain
(Anonymous)
2004-01-22 11:30 am UTC (link)
It is a shame, I had a similar problem myself.

I had been borrowing money from the local party store, my gun wasn't even loaded and noone got hurt, but they put me in jail. I even offered to return the money, but those dirty bastards are picking on me. Its not really stealing, no-one got hurt, so what is the problem???

(Reply to this)

Create an Account
Forgot your login or password?
Login w/ OpenID
English • Español • Deutsch • Русский…