Comments on: Stupid Ideas Are Still Stupid Even When Amazon Does Them

By: Mike

Mike — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 03:09:35 +0000

@154 which is just as easy to eliminate by comparing a handful of versions of the same file.

By: EternalDensity

EternalDensity — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 03:08:08 +0000

Surely substituting words isn’t necessary. All that’s needed is replacing a single space with a double space. Or ” with ”. Or and with &. And besides, 40 locations to toggle gives a billion different versions. It shouldn’t be difficult to find 40 places in a text where unnoticeable changes could be made.
Actually changing the words is unnecessary and stupid. And doing it automatically is sure to lead to stuff like: “What?” Alan said. “I’m joyous.”

By: mythago

mythago — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 23:53:20 +0000

TFernando @149 et al – I think most engineers would have a problem with writers deciding that, hey, we can swap your code around, how hard can it be to figure out? Goto and loop are the same thing, right? I have an O’Reilly’s right here for reference!

That’s kinda how a writer might react to hearing that a patent attorney or a software engineer is going to make ‘minor changes’ to their text for watermarking purposes.

By: Joel

Joel — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:45:21 +0000

Xopher @ 143

There will still be cats on coutners and dogs on the sofas of the world for generations. Surely these crimes matter!

By: Joel

Joel — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:05:58 +0000

When my wife next goes to the meat counter, she’s going to ask for peeled, flacid foul.

http://engrishfunny.com/2009/10/28/engrish-peeled-foul/

Sorry, don’t know how to embed the link.

There is at least 1 web site dedicated to nothing but how changing the words a little can change the meaning so very much.

By: Mike

Mike — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 06:47:13 +0000

Obfuscation through any of the means suggested above misses the point that it is very simple to strip out all the interesting content from a text stream and re-present it as a totally new file. If the human eye can see it and read it then none of these schemes will work.

Unlike with multimedia material, you can losslessly extract all that text to make a new book.

By: TFernando

TFernando — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 03:41:45 +0000

In the original article, Mr. Scalzi wrote: “Perhaps we should suggest we should go into this software engineer’s code and swap some of the code around. Oh, sure, it might not significantly alter the meaning of the code. But then let’s run it and see where it gets us.”

Some engineers may not actually see a problem with this. Software obfuscation– changing code so that it’s functionally equivalent but no-longer human readable, is it’s own little niche for certain types of distributions alongside encryption. (It’s commonly applied to Flash applications for example, to prevent/discourage easy replacement of assets, changing outlinks, etc). The obfuscation companies are in as much of a running battle with decompiler writers as encryption companies are with crackers.

@49- The Grey Area wrote “How about making e-books free? The catch might be that you will have to look at ads every once and a while. ”

Again, just drawing on flash games, many are freely distributed with embedded ads. Anything moderately popular is findable with the ads removed or the ads replaced with someone else’s. In that market Monetarily-Free-to-User does not discourage people from cracking encryption and obfuscation to make the software completely free. Flash games make a much smaller demand on the user’s attention than e-text. I’d be very supprised if the demand for ad-stripped e-books was smaller than the demand for ad-stripped flash, if ad-supported e-books were the norm.

By: Joann Loos

Joann Loos — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 00:38:07 +0000

According to the FTC, your maximum loss on credit cards is $50. $0 if you report it lost or stolen before it’s used.

Here’s the FTC link
http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/edu/pubs/consumer/credit/cre04.shtm

By: Xopher

Xopher — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 00:27:00 +0000

But the credit card numbers could be read from the Kindle without the user knowing anything was stolen. That’s not the same as losing your credit card. You’re liable for charges up to the time you report the theft (or perhaps a bit before, but in this scenario it could be weeks).

By: Joann Loos

Joann Loos — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 00:19:39 +0000

Xopher @145 Good point. I believe it’s no more likely than one’s wallet being stolen or their computer or someone who has their credit card number’s computer being hacked. We accept those as possible risks.

People know how to deal with a lost credit card. The credit card owner would only be liable for the same amount as if it were stolen or lost (I am guessing here. I haven’t called my credit card companies to verify).

I guess a hacker could download the file off a random person’s kindle or computer and upload it to a server for others to copy, but then that would be theft and not willful copyright infringement. Still no worse consequences than having someone put your credit card number up on the hacker boards, which already happens