cschwarm

10 ms·

31.
by cschwarm 14y ago
> Having worked for a couple of years in Germany, one thing that struck me is taxes came to almost 50% of my salary. Are you sure, you didn't mean statutory deductions? Contributions to health, unemployment, and annuity insurance are no
32.
by cschwarm 14y ago
> The social security system was crippled 5 decades ago, … Check the history of the Rentenversicherung: It was basically ruined by inflation caused by the First World War. [1] [1] http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gesetzliche_Rentenversiche
33.
by cschwarm 14y ago
The description of Germans and German behavior seems to be mostly correct, in my opinion. Some points I disagree with: - I never heard someone discuss the environmental impact of microwave ovens. - I have some doubts if the public TV statio
34.
by cschwarm 14y ago
According to Einstein, insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. A cooperation is not the natural "business" model for software. It's a club. One won't get different results if one uses the same b
35.
by cschwarm 14y ago
> Why not in the US? There are many reasons but the most important one, IIRC, is existential insecurity. The more one fears for one's wealth, health, and life, the stronger and widespread religious beliefs. The thesis goes back to Grego
36.
by cschwarm 15y ago
According to my experience, it's not so much a "moral model" but the conviction that the current model is necessary to ensure the creation of professional works. And "professional" means an equivalent amount of sparkle and glitter.
37.
by cschwarm 15y ago
Don't mistake governments with the state, or public institutions. For instance, here in Germany, we have what U.S. people would probably call 'socialized health care'. We invented it, basically. But this doesn't mean it's one gigantic insur
38.
by cschwarm 15y ago
I agree that paganel's comparison seems a bit exaggerated but note that there are non-wage labor costs here in Germany. Wikipedia reports 22 percent. A common rule of thumb is 30 percent, IIRC. This means the total wage of the truck driver
39.
by cschwarm 15y ago
>I am a little concerned that such a democratic creative process will lead to the redditification of motion picture; The conflict between art and craft is present in almost every kind of media, in my opinion: Whether it's books, music,
40.
by cschwarm 15y ago
It's a law. The justification is that it's made by democratically elected representatives. It's also not that much of a problem since we have a 5% barrier. Smaller parties usually have less money to spend on TV ads, anyway. Note that this d
41.
by cschwarm 15y ago
From Wikipedia about "Citizens United v. FEC": "the First Amendment prohibits government from placing limits on independent spending for political purposes by corporations and unions." The German system does not place rules on independent s
42.
by cschwarm 15y ago
My point was that there's no need to think that big, initially. There's also money in story driven movies and shows, as Keyframe calls it. Disruption of passive entrainment structures is more likely to happen from below, not from above.
43.
by cschwarm 15y ago
> how do you get your series in front of people? A simple answer would be 'social proof'. Mashable provides a TopTen list of the most watched shows. That's a good start but the site is too distracting for Average Joe, in my opinion. Als
44.
by cschwarm 15y ago
According to the analysis [1] from the Institute for International Film Financing [2], movies with budgets higher than 10 Mil. have a worse ratio of breaking-even: roughly 6 of 10 loose money based on box office alone vs. only 4 of 10 fail
45.
by cschwarm 15y ago
If Open Source software provides any clues, marketing is indeed a problem. Consider 'Blair Witch Project' which cost US$ 35.000 to make, was sold for US$ 1.1 Mil., and then the company spend US$ 20-25 Mil. for marketing. And this was an awe
46.
by cschwarm 15y ago
Although I'm not the OP, let me comment on these auction models: From an economic point of view, they suffer under high transaction costs. Transaction costs include legal stuff, distribution, and advertising. The later is probably the large
47.
by cschwarm 15y ago
You don't happen to have screenshots, do you? Google image search found nothing.
48.
by cschwarm 15y ago
There's probably no good answer to your question, since it depends on your choice of axioms. Given certain axioms, you might be able to logically derive the answer that "piracy" should not be punished. If I understand you correctly, you're
49.
by cschwarm 15y ago
> … but isn't this Economics 101? The problem, in my opinion, is that this is only Economics 101. During the last 50 years or so, economists found quite a lot of exceptions from the rules taught in this class. What I find puzzling is
50.
by cschwarm 15y ago
I didn't mention paid vs. unpaid, either. I was speaking about 'free' as in 'free software' vs. proprietary. My point was that you can have a proprietary system that is open. For reference, this was the argument I was replying to: > … i
51.
by cschwarm 15y ago
I'd like to remark that your argument is not valid: To know that your system won't spy on you, all you need is open code (transparency). You don't need it to be free. Theoretically, you can have a completely unfree system that is completely
52.
by cschwarm 15y ago
I think, all ideas should be given due consideration. Those that turn out to be wrong should be dismissed. The idea of the Free Software movement appears to be a wrong idea, and should be dismissed. The idea of the Open Source movement ('So
53.
by cschwarm 15y ago
I'm not quite sure what you're trying to tell me. I didn't say that Stallman has no principles, or that he is inconsistent. For me, there's just one main question: Is his conclusion -- that all software should be free software -- rational?
54.
by cschwarm 15y ago
Your response to objection number 1 misses the point. The issue is what critical thinkers would recognize as an equivocation fallacy: It's one thing to classify certain software as 'free' according to a particular definition. It's another t
55.
by cschwarm 15y ago
> Why is IP justified? From an economic point of view, by trying to prevent something like the tragedy of the commons. Since everyone can make copies if there is no ownership, the majority of authors have no incentive to make their work
56.
by cschwarm 15y ago
I would say you're mixing two different things: (1) irrational beliefs, and (2) worship. Belief in homeopathy, psychic powers, alien abductions are examples for (1), but lack (2). There is good evidence that we're predisposed for (1): Our b
57.
by cschwarm 15y ago
Indeed. Also netbooks or whatever they were called. Almost exclusively Linux in the beginning, but then almost every supplier started to use Windows.
58.
by cschwarm 15y ago
Wikipedia has a page about usage share statistics for operating systems that seems quite up-to-date: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_system... The usual caveats apply, of course. According to the web browsing data, i
59.
by cschwarm 15y ago
I wholeheartedly agree with your summery. I was absolutely fascinated by the first part; such a shame, the author wasn't able to apply its point to his own suggestion: Whether the law is made by one body or by many -- it will remain an auth
60.
by cschwarm 15y ago
> I think that's healthy skepticism. Or a rationalized expression of confirmation bias.

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