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Showing posts from March, 2012

Orbis: It's the End of the World Again: Analysts are Shitheads Edition

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I love this kind of story. Some anonymous source on a website told the world the next PlayStation will be called "Orbis" and that it will not play used games. As some random guy with a blog, I would expect me to write something about this - I did not - but why are all of these "professionals" weighing on speculation and being so very, very wrong in the speculation layered on top of speculation. While the only basis for validating the speculation is the memorialization of the thought in a series of letters comprising words on a page, the analysts feel the compulsion to comment. The very, very sad part is their commentary betrays them and shows why they are so often so very, very wrong. They see the wall, they see the train tracks, but the do not realize they are sitting on an airplane. Michael Pachter of Wedbush, David Cole of DFC Intelligence and Lewis Ward of IDC all focus on a recent announcement suggesting PS4 - they say it is called Orbis but if So

Revenge of the EULA Reader: Meta Me in a Bubble Edition

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This morning I read this great post from an artist who actually read the Pinterest EULA. I linked to her article in Scientific American because I want to make sure she gets credit for what she wrote by people reading from her page - or as she may say, the kind of thing she is afraid will not happen by virtue of the Pinterest EULA. I don't want to hold Pinterest as only the company in the world who sticks stuff like this in EULAs. In fact, I wrote about problems with other EULAs before my 23 and me post is by far the most popular post I ever wrote. I venture to say more people read my post about the 23 and me EULA then actually read the 23 and me EULA. EULAs, in the sense they are being used by the Pinterests, Facebooks, Googles and Linked ins of the world, are legal fiction granting the drafters the rights to use our data the way they want to use it today and how they may use it in the future. I saw legal fiction not just because there is not a single word in any of the