Limewire sued for.......$75 Trillion dollars :)

[birdwith2beaksandnofriends]

Don't worry - once communism wins out, you'll all be low paid workers.

I can see a few people having a problem with the last word in that sentence.

[FoxyPV]

12 on the short scale which tends to be used everywhere nowadays (6 million, 9 billion). On the long scale 12 is a billion (I think) so I think a trillion would be 18. I'd imagine they're talking about the short scale

Sorry for being dim, but what's short form and long form?

Didn't a billion used to equate to a million million?

Would a trillion then be a million billion?

[Captain...]

Sorry for being dim, but what's short form and long form?

Didn't a billion used to equate to a million million?

Would a trillion then be a million billion?

In the States and countries that speak a true latin based language it is a thousand million, in the UK it is a million million.

We are the odd ones out in this case.

[Alexikokopops]

Sorry for being dim, but what's short form and long form?

Didn't a billion used to equate to a million million?

Would a trillion then be a million billion?

Long scale is the English translation of the French term échelle longue. It refers to a system of large-number names in which every new term greater than million is 1,000,000 times the previous term: billion means a million millions (10¹²), trillion means a million billions (10¹⁸), and so on.^[1][2]

Short scale is the English translation of the French term échelle courte. It refers to a system of large-number names in which every new term greater than million is 1,000 times the previous term: billion means a thousand millions (10⁹), trillion means a thousand billions (10¹²), and so on.^[1][2]

^{http://en.wikipedia....nd_short_scales}

[lcfc"weasel"]

I've always used short scale, it just seems to make much more sense to me.

[Phube]

Phube will be happy

About time too, surely all those that have used LimeWire can chip in a few (hundred thousand) quid to help them out!

How many zero's is that?.

$75,000,000,000,000!

[ozleicester]

i put my $8000 on a 1-0 win by SWFC

My $8000, is now, $88,000... im going to lump all that on Adkins to take us up.... thatll be my Million$... ill be king

[leicsmac]

About time too, surely all those that have used LimeWire can chip in a few (hundred thousand) quid to help them out!

Possibly. Or maybe it's about time the movie and music industry dinosaurs realised that we are in the Digital Age, and with the Internet this kind of piracy (illegal as it is) is NEVER going to stop, regardless of how much legislation they try to pursue.

So rather than wasting time (and money) on legalese, they should change their business and distribution models to reflect the times we are in now, rather than trying (and failing) to keep their current obsolete model going.

[Webbo]

Possibly. Or maybe it's about time the movie and music industry dinosaurs realised that we are in the Digital Age, and with the Internet this kind of piracy (illegal as it is) is NEVER going to stop, regardless of how much legislation they try to pursue.

So rather than wasting time (and money) on legalese, they should change their business and distribution models to reflect the times we are in now, rather than trying (and failing) to keep their current obsolete model going.

What do you suggest?

[leicsmac]

What do you suggest?

Liase with authorities to unify the copyright process so that material is easier to distribute online.

Give a bigger cut of any contract to the artists themselves.

Save costs by utilising website technology further.

But ultimately...be prepared for a drop in profits, because they are not really needed in anywhere near as big a capacity anymore. Not when an 8-year old with a home PC could promote a music album, and the artists would get a much bigger share.

Of course what I've said above largely applies to the music label industry. The movie distribution industry is far more robust because of the insanely high production/promotion costs a big movie needs, so they probably don't need to change much actually - they're still relevant.

[Webbo]

Liase with authorities to unify the copyright process so that material is easier to distribute online.

Give a bigger cut of any contract to the artists themselves.

Save costs by utilising website technology further.

But ultimately...be prepared for a drop in profits, because they are not really needed in anywhere near as big a capacity anymore. Not when an 8-year old with a home PC could promote a music album, and the artists would get a much bigger share.

Of course what I've said above largely applies to the music label industry. The movie distribution industry is far more robust because of the insanely high production/promotion costs a big movie needs, so they probably don't need to change much actually - they're still relevant.

People are downloading music/films/books for free, you've got to liaise hell of a lot to make money out of that.

[leicsmac]

People are downloading music/films/books for free, you've got to liaise hell of a lot to make money out of that.

The genie is out of the bottle and you're not going to stop that. Not while people still have access to the Internet and are halfway savvy with a computer. Given the ease of digital compression and the ubiquitousness of the Internet, and the popularity of films/books/music, you're never going to be able to block all these items from being pirated on the Internet. It's simply not possible.

The film and book companies are going to be fine because their business models are still viable - people will always want to watch a film in a cinema (making more money than ever) and read a hard copy of a book, two things that your Average Joe cannot produce or obtain himself and will continue to pay for.

But I honestly think the music distribution industry has had its day. The future will be direct releasing by artists via digital download. As the middle-man is cut out the costs will come down and as a result so will album prices, giving a better incentive not to pirate.

Of course there will always be those who will go after something for free, but a combination of reducing album prices and the knowledge that most of the money is going to the ones that truly deserve it - the artists - will convince more people to buy their music legally.

This is no cut and dried solution, but at the moment the more authorities try to clamp down on online pirating, the more determined people are to get around it. And the distributors are going to keep haemorraging money.