DRM and the annoyed consumer...

Today a few DVDs showed up in my mailbox - a day ahead of schedule. I popped DVD numero uno in my DVD player and promptly was annoyed. You couldn't skip to the main menu without both a Universal Pictures intro sequence plus an anti-piracy warning that seems to run for a full 15 seconds or so. Once again I'm reminded of why a lot of people prefer to download things. DRM generally means that people can enjoy a superior product by going the illegal way (or in the case of music the disapproved-of-by-record-companies way). Crippling your customers is generally not a good way to get them to buy your products, unless you've already gotten them locked in.

This time the silly control lockouts most DVD players have built in were finally enough to push me over the edge and start digging around for hacks for the player. The only one that I've uncovered thus far is the typical region-free hack, but that doesn't accomplish what I want.

Postmodernism, Hinduism, or the new atheism?

Cessationist or not?

Dan and I have were recently discussing the differences between cessationism and a continuationist view of spiritual gifts in the context of this article on what I'll dub "cessationist healings". In the 12th comment to that article, Tim offers his own definition of cessationism:

Cessationists, quite simply, believe that the miraculous gifts of the Spirit were given for a specific purpose and thus a specific time. These gifts have since ceased. Miracles still happen, but do not depend on the spiritual gifts.

So while we believe that the gift of tongues is no longer operative, we still believe that God can miraculously give someone the ability to speak in a language he does not rightly know. It's just that this person does not have the gift of tongues. We believe that God can still heal miraculously but do not believe that there are people with the spiritual gift of healing. We believe that people can still prophecy (think of John Huss, who before he died, prophecied something like "You are now going to burn a goose, but in a century you will have a swan which you can neither roast nor boil." This prophecy came true in the Reformation, but did not rely on the spiritual gift of prophecy.

So we do not believe that the miraculous has ceased. We believe that the gift has ceased. Most charismatics (or continuationists) do not understand this distinction.

Would you classify the events/views describes in the article as being cessationist or not?

Aren't flights supposed to get more expensive in the summer?

Since I'm supposed to be showing up sometime this summer I figured that I should get some tickets booked early since the summer isn't known for being cheap to fly in. Westjet seemed to have some cheap flights available but then one or more of the following caused me to change my mind and fly Air Canada instead. Did I:

  1. Get scared by the idea that Jon now works for Westjet? (just kidding)
  2. Want to listen to the Air Canada crew struggle to pretend that they actually spoke French? (which has been mildly amusing on past Air Canada flights)
  3. Discover another type of jet flying the Vancouver - Calgary run that I hadn't yet flown on? (I'm referring to an Embraer 190 which looks to be a nice plane and is scheduled to be used for one leg of my journey)
  4. Want to pay $162.85 (all fees and taxes included) for a return flight?

If memory serves correct, I'm paying about $30 more than a "free" flight costs with Airmiles. Like I said above - whatever happened to flights getting more expensive in the summer?

Pages

Subscribe to Rotundus.com RSS