The US became a fascist dictatorship the moment Trump got elected again. That they're incompetent and therefore do not have the total power they want or use what they have effectively, doesn't change this.
That this was always obviously going to happen (due to the knowledge of Project 2025) is why Trump's re-election remains as much of a black mark on the US as its support and use of slavery.
Capitalism was a reaction to too few people ( monarchs etc.) having power and wealth, and the moment capitalism reaches the same point, the reversion to feudalism should also be expected.
There IS no 'personal liberty' if you have no food, no shelter, no healthcare, clothing etc.. If you don't understand the existence of society and civilization, then you don't deserve it, do you? At which point there is nothing to defend because you're already dead.
To say that 'the centre is where reality lives' is STILL propaganda, based on a misunderstanding of what right and left truly represent.
To try and stake any claim on this, is to therefore serve the authoritarians.
Left vs right, fundamentally, ESPECIALLY in the US, is a matter of collective vs individual.
But human existence is a matter of collective society, especially as great as our modern civilizations are, and so reality has a left-leaning ('liberal') bias for a good reason, and is why this alignment is what reality truly is.
The reason for the stong far-right 'individualist' propaganda of the US is simply to divide and conquer on behalf of the rich, from the very beginning, which has happened multiple times, including now... And this type of response is how and why it works - when even those who want to be 'real' and stand against them still end up supporting it...
Some of us (I'm from the UK) have been calling this out for a while, (before Trump even got elected the first time), but there's one unfortuante truth undermining everything in the US right now - that the US as a country just does not UNDERSTAND fascism, which is how and why a minority of actual facsists have come to control it to begin with. Unfortunately, this is also by design and intent, which is precisely how and why what is happening in the US right now has been almost inevitable for most of its existence.
The problem with divide and conquer as a strategy, is that it works too well :P
The Spoils System IS EXACTLY what they want back - the whole point about railing against the 'deep state' is to destroy the professional civil service and return the US to a previous corrupt existence so the rich can make even more money and eventually turn the US in a neo-feudalist state (like the Norman's had in England after their invasion).
When too few people have wealth and power, we go from feudalism to capitalism back to feudalism, it seems...
Although there are a group of people like and around Trump that are in it for the short-term cruelty, power and any riches they can grab before it all goes to pot, there are others in the background who are more in it for the long haul.
For these people, even a fascist dictatorship like the US now (unofficially) is, is still merely a stepping stone to what they truly want - neo-feudalism.
And by neo-feudalism, what we really mean is the equivalent of England after the Norman invasion - rule by a 'foreign' occupation.
Authoritarianism has been a default for humanity for a long time, because trying to get anything else to work at scale was an issue, and greedy selfish people kept finding ways to gain power regardless of whatever anyone did. So long as they took some of their responsibility seriously, they generally got away with it.
The whole point about capitalism was because the feudal society before it concetrated wealth and power into too few hands for other greedy people, they had to separate wealth and power more than it had been.
As global wealth becomes ever more concentrated, again, it should be no surprise that they want the more direct power to go with it that feudalism used to provide. Unfortuantely, this lot couldn't care less about any type of repsonsibility or patriotism etc. - they're purely in it for themselves, everyone else be damned. Even some more recent authoritarians would be disgusted with them for this reason.
A lot of people don't realise that the US has already gone through that entire process form its founding, but actually succeeded in creating a 'civilized' society, due to enough immigrants from countries that already had one (e.g. Germany/Netherlands etc.). Again, the GOP (and the type of people that now support it), and now Trump and Musk want to undo all of that progress, because it's the only thing stopping them from owning the entire country.
That civilization itself has become their enemy, is the entire point.
The whole point about complaining about the 'Deep State' by the GOP, is part of the with to undo all progress made during the 20th Century, and revert back to The Spoils System, getting rid of the professional Civil Service. Their complaints are therefore that the Civil Service isn't corruptible enough for their liking...
Of course, what they really want is to turn the US into the equivalent of the England after the Norman invasion - neo-feudalism.
Why is your right to speech more important than my right not to associate with your speech?
This simple question, right here, demonstrates exactly how and why the US is, has been, and always will be a country fundamentally at war with itself.
When being created as a Federal nation, it was intended to be based on being the opposite of a monarchy, (since that's what had been rebelled against and fought for independence of).
The problem is that merely going from one extreme to the other, only ends up causing different problems.
For this reason, the underlying basis of the US is seen to be that of freedom TO do something, taken as far as possible, now they were free FROM a foreign monarch's rule.
But the extremes of such freedom has never been the underlying freedom humanity has ever truly cared for - if it did, then it would want and love anarchy above all else, when we find the exact opposite is true - that it puts up with the worst of all situations just to escape from anarchy.
For this reason, the most important freedom for humanity is the freedom from harm, death, starvation, exposure etc..
(Of course, this also works for other types of freedom too, such as religion.)
Since these freedoms are the underlying reason for how and why civilization, and billions of people worldwide (and hundreds of millions domestically for the US) actually live and survive, we can therefore understand how and why the US has anti-civilization extremists in numbers large enough to take over a main political party.
Since the freedom TO do anything only matters if you're free from death and harm, it should be no surprise that many of the extremists have taken this to it's logical conclusion and are now exercising the only personal freedom that can ever matter in such context: the freedom to die.
Analogies are not needed if it's truly recognised what this is about, which seems to be a problem for many:
The difference between the use of language, and the rules that govern it.
An API is simply an ADDITIONAL set of rules (that may be more subjective) governing how language is used for greater consistency. A set of rules governing how to apply the English language as 'Yodaspeak' would be an 'API'. Since such rules are completely functional, and used to enable creative expression, they are as unsuitable for copyright protection as any other rules of grammar/content.
Just because you can create a language, and have many subjective rules governing it, does not make either of them suitable for copyright protection in themselves: whether it's speech or computer code makes no difference.
One of the problems with understanding this issue, is that so many people seem to be invested in bad analogies to explain it without involving computers, when easier, simple analogies are easily available/figured out.
What we're dealing with here, is the application of language.
On one side, we have the basic rules of language itself, (in addition to any further rules of communication they involve) which are not copyrightable in themselves.
On the other, we have what it is we use and apply the language to create.
So how do API's fit in between?
By providing additional rules to govern what is being created to ensure further interoperability.
So an equivalent of an API for the English language would be a definition and set of rules governing how English can be APPLIED to CREATE sentences and passages of 'Yodaspeak'.
Such rules do NOT CREATE such passages, they just define the rules and process they follow when doing so.
Are the rules defining and governing 'Yodaspeak' in themselves copyrightable? No. They could be APPLIED in a way that is, yes, but not in themselves, because they still form rules governing language, which are not copyrightable to ensure such interoperability in the first place - since that is what language is FOR.
The US second amendment is already dead, killed by a Republican Supreme Court in 2010, but most people haven't realised it.
The whole point about the US Bill Of Rights is that it was intended as a limitation on FEDERAL power, vs the States, and the second amendment therefore existed within the context of such State led, managed and regulated militias being something the FEDERAL government should have no power or influence over. (Without this as a bulwark against potential Federal overreach, there wouldn't have been enough states to ratify the new Constitution.)
So the whole point about the 2nd amendment was that it was up the States to manage the use of firearms as part of their militia and the Federal government had no say in the matter. This meant that managing the use of arms within the context of state militia, was intended to be managed as a local issue, by local people, dealing with local context. (There's always going to be a difference between necessary regulation in rural and urban areas, and the second amendment allowed for this.)
In 2010 EVERYTHING CHANGED.
The Republican-led Supreme Court chose to incorporate the 2nd amendment under the 14th.
This means that rather than being of the States for the Federal government to obey, the second amendment, is now of the FEDERAL government, FOR the States to obey, and so any changes in regulation etc. that the Federal government makes to the second amendment is something the States can no longer resist, as a matter of law.
---------------
It seems that many people have no recognition and understanding of just how and why the US Republican Party has been slowly putting the pieces together to support a fascist state for quite some time, with this being one of the main ones.
(Note: in case people don't fully understand fascism:
It is essentially a dictatorship writ large - (which is why the tend start in such a manner, though it's not required) - with the state itself (or the ruling government/party as is usually the case), acting as a dictator in its whole. Such political structure is therefore extreme right wing, next to dictatorship/monarchy itself. As far as their economic and social orientation is concerned however, that can vary, of being either side, depending on the whims of the 'state'.
"Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state". (For state: read government/party))
If people don't think the US Republican Party would like to, and is trying to do everything they can to turn the US into an effectively 1 party state, then... (Unfortunately, I think Trump came a bit too soon for them to get the most out of him following the midterms - though if they get even more Supreme Court justices, then...)
Many people have a problem with sports that are non athletic etc., and this happens for a good reason, because they think that sport is defined as and by the nature of the competitive activity itself.
Which is wrong. Activities are defined by what they are, nothing more - (e.g. games, competitions, puzzles etc., in addition to being work or play.)
What defines a sport, is the regulation and organisation around and supporting it, so we can have regional, national and international sports given the nature of such regulation and organisation. (Only having one of these, regulation OR organisation is not enough - sport always needs both.)
Any competitive activity that has such regulation and organisation is therefore a sport. Computer games have long since had such regulation and organisation, just not necessarily on this scale before, and so have no problems being a sport.
So their main complaint is that the Steele dossier has been used as part of the evidence given for an application for FISA warrant, and that it makes unproven, uncollaborated/unsupported, partisan allegations, even if serious and important.
Sounds like the claims in the dossier are something that needs to be investigated, maybe by a Federal Bureau of Investigation or something, just to be sure...
As I said below - 2.4 of the GLA is a standard non-compete clause - to prevent CIG from developing their own ENGINE as their BUSINESS, rather than developing a game using such an engine.
Anyone reading this as anything else, is simply not reading to correctly/accurately AS WRITTEN, which includes Crytek, apparently.
This GLA between Crytek and CIG is too ambiguous is places, and was obviously written either in a hurry or by amateurs :P
Having said that, trying to make out that a (fairly standard) non-compete clause (against CIG developing their own game engine) is instead a clause determining exclusive use of CryEngine FOR the game (no other engine allowed) is just bullshit.
The moment CIG swapped to using Lumberyard (new contract between CIG and Amazon), and stopped using CryEngine the GLA between Crytek and CIG is no longer applicable.
For this reason, the two viable claims they do have, only matter for the time until this happened:
Failure to reciprocate bug fixes and improvements to the engine, and failure to display engine use and copyright ownership notices etc. with the product.
The only other ambiguous aspect is how it applies to Squadron 42 - on one hand it describes it as a separate game, but on the other it also details that it must use the same basic launcher-executable as Star Citizen. If this didn't happen while they were using CryEngine (not Lumberyard), then Crytek may also have a (minor) case regardless of it being described (and therefore allowed to exist) as a separate game.
Fascism...
The US became a fascist dictatorship the moment Trump got elected again. That they're incompetent and therefore do not have the total power they want or use what they have effectively, doesn't change this. That this was always obviously going to happen (due to the knowledge of Project 2025) is why Trump's re-election remains as much of a black mark on the US as its support and use of slavery.
As I've repled elsewhere...
Capitalism was a reaction to too few people ( monarchs etc.) having power and wealth, and the moment capitalism reaches the same point, the reversion to feudalism should also be expected.
There IS no 'personal liberty' if you have no food, no shelter, no healthcare, clothing etc.. If you don't understand the existence of society and civilization, then you don't deserve it, do you? At which point there is nothing to defend because you're already dead.
The centre is NOT what even you think it is...
To say that 'the centre is where reality lives' is STILL propaganda, based on a misunderstanding of what right and left truly represent. To try and stake any claim on this, is to therefore serve the authoritarians. Left vs right, fundamentally, ESPECIALLY in the US, is a matter of collective vs individual. But human existence is a matter of collective society, especially as great as our modern civilizations are, and so reality has a left-leaning ('liberal') bias for a good reason, and is why this alignment is what reality truly is. The reason for the stong far-right 'individualist' propaganda of the US is simply to divide and conquer on behalf of the rich, from the very beginning, which has happened multiple times, including now... And this type of response is how and why it works - when even those who want to be 'real' and stand against them still end up supporting it...
Fascism...
Some of us (I'm from the UK) have been calling this out for a while, (before Trump even got elected the first time), but there's one unfortuante truth undermining everything in the US right now - that the US as a country just does not UNDERSTAND fascism, which is how and why a minority of actual facsists have come to control it to begin with. Unfortunately, this is also by design and intent, which is precisely how and why what is happening in the US right now has been almost inevitable for most of its existence. The problem with divide and conquer as a strategy, is that it works too well :P
The Spoils System IS EXACTLY what they want back - the whole point about railing against the 'deep state' is to destroy the professional civil service and return the US to a previous corrupt existence so the rich can make even more money and eventually turn the US in a neo-feudalist state (like the Norman's had in England after their invasion). When too few people have wealth and power, we go from feudalism to capitalism back to feudalism, it seems...
True End Game....
Although there are a group of people like and around Trump that are in it for the short-term cruelty, power and any riches they can grab before it all goes to pot, there are others in the background who are more in it for the long haul. For these people, even a fascist dictatorship like the US now (unofficially) is, is still merely a stepping stone to what they truly want - neo-feudalism. And by neo-feudalism, what we really mean is the equivalent of England after the Norman invasion - rule by a 'foreign' occupation. Authoritarianism has been a default for humanity for a long time, because trying to get anything else to work at scale was an issue, and greedy selfish people kept finding ways to gain power regardless of whatever anyone did. So long as they took some of their responsibility seriously, they generally got away with it. The whole point about capitalism was because the feudal society before it concetrated wealth and power into too few hands for other greedy people, they had to separate wealth and power more than it had been. As global wealth becomes ever more concentrated, again, it should be no surprise that they want the more direct power to go with it that feudalism used to provide. Unfortuantely, this lot couldn't care less about any type of repsonsibility or patriotism etc. - they're purely in it for themselves, everyone else be damned. Even some more recent authoritarians would be disgusted with them for this reason.
A lot of people don't realise that the US has already gone through that entire process form its founding, but actually succeeded in creating a 'civilized' society, due to enough immigrants from countries that already had one (e.g. Germany/Netherlands etc.). Again, the GOP (and the type of people that now support it), and now Trump and Musk want to undo all of that progress, because it's the only thing stopping them from owning the entire country. That civilization itself has become their enemy, is the entire point.
Deep State...
The whole point about complaining about the 'Deep State' by the GOP, is part of the with to undo all progress made during the 20th Century, and revert back to The Spoils System, getting rid of the professional Civil Service. Their complaints are therefore that the Civil Service isn't corruptible enough for their liking... Of course, what they really want is to turn the US into the equivalent of the England after the Norman invasion - neo-feudalism.
Freedom...
Why is your right to speech more important than my right not to associate with your speech?
This simple question, right here, demonstrates exactly how and why the US is, has been, and always will be a country fundamentally at war with itself.
When being created as a Federal nation, it was intended to be based on being the opposite of a monarchy, (since that's what had been rebelled against and fought for independence of).
The problem is that merely going from one extreme to the other, only ends up causing different problems.
For this reason, the underlying basis of the US is seen to be that of freedom TO do something, taken as far as possible, now they were free FROM a foreign monarch's rule.
But the extremes of such freedom has never been the underlying freedom humanity has ever truly cared for - if it did, then it would want and love anarchy above all else, when we find the exact opposite is true - that it puts up with the worst of all situations just to escape from anarchy.
For this reason, the most important freedom for humanity is the freedom from harm, death, starvation, exposure etc..
(Of course, this also works for other types of freedom too, such as religion.)
Since these freedoms are the underlying reason for how and why civilization, and billions of people worldwide (and hundreds of millions domestically for the US) actually live and survive, we can therefore understand how and why the US has anti-civilization extremists in numbers large enough to take over a main political party.
Since the freedom TO do anything only matters if you're free from death and harm, it should be no surprise that many of the extremists have taken this to it's logical conclusion and are now exercising the only personal freedom that can ever matter in such context: the freedom to die.
Hmmm...
I speak dead people...
Re: There's no need for an 'analogy'...
Analogies are not needed if it's truly recognised what this is about, which seems to be a problem for many: The difference between the use of language, and the rules that govern it. An API is simply an ADDITIONAL set of rules (that may be more subjective) governing how language is used for greater consistency. A set of rules governing how to apply the English language as 'Yodaspeak' would be an 'API'. Since such rules are completely functional, and used to enable creative expression, they are as unsuitable for copyright protection as any other rules of grammar/content. Just because you can create a language, and have many subjective rules governing it, does not make either of them suitable for copyright protection in themselves: whether it's speech or computer code makes no difference.
Too many bad analogies...
One of the problems with understanding this issue, is that so many people seem to be invested in bad analogies to explain it without involving computers, when easier, simple analogies are easily available/figured out.
What we're dealing with here, is the application of language.
On one side, we have the basic rules of language itself, (in addition to any further rules of communication they involve) which are not copyrightable in themselves.
On the other, we have what it is we use and apply the language to create.
So how do API's fit in between?
By providing additional rules to govern what is being created to ensure further interoperability.
So an equivalent of an API for the English language would be a definition and set of rules governing how English can be APPLIED to CREATE sentences and passages of 'Yodaspeak'.
Such rules do NOT CREATE such passages, they just define the rules and process they follow when doing so.
Are the rules defining and governing 'Yodaspeak' in themselves copyrightable? No. They could be APPLIED in a way that is, yes, but not in themselves, because they still form rules governing language, which are not copyrightable to ensure such interoperability in the first place - since that is what language is FOR.
But I thought...
That merely collecting data didn't matter until someone actually looked at/listened to it :P
Note:
The US second amendment is already dead, killed by a Republican Supreme Court in 2010, but most people haven't realised it.
The whole point about the US Bill Of Rights is that it was intended as a limitation on FEDERAL power, vs the States, and the second amendment therefore existed within the context of such State led, managed and regulated militias being something the FEDERAL government should have no power or influence over. (Without this as a bulwark against potential Federal overreach, there wouldn't have been enough states to ratify the new Constitution.)
So the whole point about the 2nd amendment was that it was up the States to manage the use of firearms as part of their militia and the Federal government had no say in the matter. This meant that managing the use of arms within the context of state militia, was intended to be managed as a local issue, by local people, dealing with local context. (There's always going to be a difference between necessary regulation in rural and urban areas, and the second amendment allowed for this.)
In 2010 EVERYTHING CHANGED.
The Republican-led Supreme Court chose to incorporate the 2nd amendment under the 14th.
This means that rather than being of the States for the Federal government to obey, the second amendment, is now of the FEDERAL government, FOR the States to obey, and so any changes in regulation etc. that the Federal government makes to the second amendment is something the States can no longer resist, as a matter of law.
---------------
It seems that many people have no recognition and understanding of just how and why the US Republican Party has been slowly putting the pieces together to support a fascist state for quite some time, with this being one of the main ones.
(Note: in case people don't fully understand fascism:
It is essentially a dictatorship writ large - (which is why the tend start in such a manner, though it's not required) - with the state itself (or the ruling government/party as is usually the case), acting as a dictator in its whole. Such political structure is therefore extreme right wing, next to dictatorship/monarchy itself. As far as their economic and social orientation is concerned however, that can vary, of being either side, depending on the whims of the 'state'.
"Everything within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state". (For state: read government/party))
If people don't think the US Republican Party would like to, and is trying to do everything they can to turn the US into an effectively 1 party state, then... (Unfortunately, I think Trump came a bit too soon for them to get the most out of him following the midterms - though if they get even more Supreme Court justices, then...)
A general message for all concerned: (What is sport?)
Many people have a problem with sports that are non athletic etc., and this happens for a good reason, because they think that sport is defined as and by the nature of the competitive activity itself.
Which is wrong. Activities are defined by what they are, nothing more - (e.g. games, competitions, puzzles etc., in addition to being work or play.)
What defines a sport, is the regulation and organisation around and supporting it, so we can have regional, national and international sports given the nature of such regulation and organisation. (Only having one of these, regulation OR organisation is not enough - sport always needs both.)
Any competitive activity that has such regulation and organisation is therefore a sport. Computer games have long since had such regulation and organisation, just not necessarily on this scale before, and so have no problems being a sport.
Hmmm...
I guess net-neutrality in the US needs to be destroyed in order to be saved, or something like that? :P :-/ :(
Hmmm...
So their main complaint is that the Steele dossier has been used as part of the evidence given for an application for FISA warrant, and that it makes unproven, uncollaborated/unsupported, partisan allegations, even if serious and important.
Sounds like the claims in the dossier are something that needs to be investigated, maybe by a Federal Bureau of Investigation or something, just to be sure...
Re: Re: Re:
As I said below - 2.4 of the GLA is a standard non-compete clause - to prevent CIG from developing their own ENGINE as their BUSINESS, rather than developing a game using such an engine.
Anyone reading this as anything else, is simply not reading to correctly/accurately AS WRITTEN, which includes Crytek, apparently.
Been following this for a while...
This GLA between Crytek and CIG is too ambiguous is places, and was obviously written either in a hurry or by amateurs :P
Having said that, trying to make out that a (fairly standard) non-compete clause (against CIG developing their own game engine) is instead a clause determining exclusive use of CryEngine FOR the game (no other engine allowed) is just bullshit.
The moment CIG swapped to using Lumberyard (new contract between CIG and Amazon), and stopped using CryEngine the GLA between Crytek and CIG is no longer applicable.
For this reason, the two viable claims they do have, only matter for the time until this happened:
Failure to reciprocate bug fixes and improvements to the engine, and failure to display engine use and copyright ownership notices etc. with the product.
The only other ambiguous aspect is how it applies to Squadron 42 - on one hand it describes it as a separate game, but on the other it also details that it must use the same basic launcher-executable as Star Citizen. If this didn't happen while they were using CryEngine (not Lumberyard), then Crytek may also have a (minor) case regardless of it being described (and therefore allowed to exist) as a separate game.