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One of the key players in the persuading the FCC to let AOLIM be kept is William P. Rogerson, former FCC chair and economist at Northwestern. I couldn't find his paper but the dissenting opinions of Gerald R. Faulhaber and David J. Farber; both UPenn Econmics professors give a great opinion on why AOL has been behaving badlly (All gentlemen have held high ranking positions on the FCC). Its in PDF but their criticisms of Rogerson's draft are striking,

"AOL Time Warner's strategic behavior has not changed, and that is perhaps the most compelling evidence that they believe they can eventually tip the market by refusing to interoperate. Such strategic behavior only makes sense if the market leader expects the market to tip in its favor; otherwise, interoperation is their best strategy. But the Petition and the Affidavit are strangely and tellingly silent on this key piece of evidence.

We also note that AOL Time Warner failed to exploit its newly acquired cable assets to deploy an AOL Broadband service. Since the firm had no Broadband service, it had little reason to care about advanced IM services such as two-way video that are not feasible on dial-up connections. However, AOL Time Warner has just recently begun marketing AOL Broadband, apparently now trying to capitalize on its cable assets. It should not come as a surprise that as AOL Time Warner rolls out its new broadband offering, it wishes to be relieved of the requirement to interoperate if it offers an IM-based high-speed service. Their behavior suggests that they may well have such a service ready to roll out soon as a feature of their AOL Broadband, and wish to keep their network effects proprietary. In fact, it is precisely this case that the Merger Order anticipated when it imposed the IM condition.

We urge the FCC to proceed cautiously. While conditions have evolved since the Merger Order that suggest network effects and tipping are not as urgent today, other evidence suggests that it is perhaps even more urgent. The FCC needs to recall that AOL Time Warner has in its own hands the ability to offer advanced IM-based highspeed services without let or hindrance: it need only interoperate with its competitors, as it promised the world it would do two years ago, to the benefit of all customers."

Look at articles like this and this and decide carefully before you invest your time and money into what is rapidly becoming a dead-end career.

After reading this I can only conclude that CNET is on the SCO payroll..

http://news.com.com/2100-1016-5065422.html?tag=nl

Getting a glimpse at SCO's evidence
By Lisa M. Bowman
Staff Writer, CNET News.com
August 19, 2003, 6:22 AM PT
http://news.com.com/2100-1016-5065422.html

LAS VEGAS--When SCO Group first filed its lawsuit against IBM in March, critics characterized the move as the last gasp of an ailing company hoping to strike a series of lucrative licensing deals.

Since then the company has come out swinging even harder, bashing its detractors, standing by its allegations, and most recently, posting a profit that SCO said would allow it to continue its aggressive intellectual property fight.

At the SCO Forum here Monday, the company pulled out its latest weapon: lines and lines of disputed code that were allegedly copied from SCO's Unix into IBM's version of Linux. The company claims that IBM illegally copied Unix code into its version of Linux, and it's warning Linux customers that they may be violating copyright by using the operating system without paying SCO. It's also recently announced a new licensing plan that would require Linux customers to pay between $199 and $699 per computer.

In a quiet conference room tucked into the conference center at the MGM Grand, SCO offered customers, partners and the merely curious the chance to view the code for themselves, as long as they signed a nondisclosure agreement.

Companies involved in litigation traditionally keep such information under wraps in order not to tip their legal hand, but SCO said it decided to display the code because its critics were charging that it didn't have a case.

"Given the nature of this case and that there may be a significant period of time before it's resolved and that people were clamoring to see it, we decided to show a few pieces of evidence," said Chris Sontag, senior vice president of the SCOsource unit, which is charged with protecting SCO's Unix-related intellectual property.

As of the end of the day on Monday, more than 150 people had seen the code presentation, which the company said includes a small portion of the infringing code it has found so far. Sontag said the company has uncovered more than a million lines of copied code in Linux, with the help of pattern recognition experts.

A compelling case?
According to those who viewed the code at SCO Forum, company representatives showed off several categories of code that allegedly infringed its copyrights, including some lines that appeared to be directly copied, some that were derivative works and some that were obfuscated, such as code from which legal disclaimers had been removed. (This reporter declined to sign the nondisclosure agreement required to attend the special sessions where the companies showed off a special side-by-side comparison of the code, opting instead to gather reactions from people who saw the presentation.)

After viewing the code, Don Price, general manager of Price Data Systems, said he was surprised at the volume that was allegedly copied. "It's compelling," he said. "Some people were either extremely sloppy, or copied and thought no one would go after them."

Neil Abraham, with SCO reseller Kerridge Computer, said SCO made the right decision to pursue IBM. "I think they've got a very firm case," he said, after looking at the code. "It's not just one line. It's huge chunks."

Bob Ungetti, of Raven Technologies, who was milling about waiting to get into a room where the code was being shown off, said he wanted to see the code because his customers have been asking him about the suit. "I want to see the code myself just to substantiate the claims SCO is making, so when I talk to my customers about the credibility of the lawsuit, I can say I saw it for myself," said Ungetti, whose company is a reseller for SCO. "If they're interested in using Linux, they're conc

The NDA only applied to the portions shown in a special session. These pictures are from a NDA-less conference. See CNET News: Getting a Glimpse at SCO's Evidence

I'm a graphic designer working for a small design firm. We're still mostly working
in an OS 9 environment, running QuarkXpress 4.1.

The senior designer/IT geek here had a poll whether we want to upgrade to Quark 6
or go with Adobe InDesign. Most of us are sick of Quark's "idiosyncracies".
Quark's noodle code delayed OS X compatibility for 2 years. I like Adobe's
standardization between apps, but that's just a way of seeding dependence in customers (a la MS).
Will Adobe become the Microsoft of the design field? Probably not,
since Adobe's interface actually makes sense and is consistent (with some exceptions).
But they've been the plaintiff on the wrong side of court cases
a little too often for me to be very enthusiastic.

So it's down to choosing the lesser of two evils.

I guess I'm sort of rare in that I understand something of what printing companies
go through - trying to get files supplied by designers clueless to how a layout is put to paper.
The thought of trapping some of the pieces I've seen makes me shudder.
{smartass}That's why they get the big bucks, right? {/smartass}

http://news.com.com/2100-1016_3-5065422.html

Neil Abraham, with SCO reseller Kerridge Computer, said SCO made the right decision to pursue IBM. "I think they've got a very firm case," he said, after looking at the code. "It's not just one line. It's huge chunks."

Humor you? People that maintain and patch MS systems for a living *should* have a favorite grouping of mailing lists and forums to follow information like this. If you are truely interested I would suggest you subscribe to the NTBugtraq mailing list for starters. Just because you choose to limit your knowledge to what is posted on slashdot does not mean these things do not exist. Many of the introduced bugs are somewhat small, may not effect more then a small % of the users, and fixed with relative ease but they still exist. Specific to NTBugtraq, if there is a problem, you will noramlly see a reply within a day or so of the lists announcing the MS patch. The group knowledge is very helpful in troubleshooting and repairing any issues. Very few of the patches cause something major to fail but that does happen also.

Here is a couple of quick finds from Google. I don't track or keep lists of problems like you are requesting. I do monitor select mailing lists and web sites and take note of things that will directly effect me. These bugs or lack of fixes were a little bigger so they got news coverage.

NT patch causes other services to fail
Microsoft patch causes system failure
Microsoft Knowledge Base Article - 192816
Super patch fails to fix worst flaw in Internet Explorer
Microsoft fails Slammer's security test Not a direct patch failure but describes the complexity of deploying some patches and the side effects.
Researchers: Newest Microsoft IE patch flawed

Napster provided free promotion. When music is promoted, it sells, unless it sucks so bad even teens don't like it. That is basic and simple. Now, during the Kazaa era, sales are down directly proportional to production being down. Considering the economy, and the millions angry at the industry, sales should be down a lot more, but they aren't. The labels have created an artificial sales slump so they can cry piracy. Here are some informative links:

1 2 3 dozens mone can be found on external links at dontbuycds.org

From this link on the SCO Forum, on a slide show regarding the copied code

Much of the Unix code in the slides was obscured, because the company wants to keep its intellectual property under wraps, but SCO is allowing people who want to see a more extensive side-by-side comparison during the conference to do so if they sign a nondisclosure agreement.

So, here's a vaguely blurry picture of the code that proves we're right . . .

This is the equivalent of blurry pictures of the Loch Ness Monster and Bigfoot, except I give them MUCH more credibility.

but they're still bluring out other parts

http://news.com.com/2100-1016_3-5065286.html

Didn't you forget about the battle with the two year old over the domain Veronica.org?

Actually I was talking about the reverse engineering and unauthorized access in regard to the DMCA. In case you haven't heard, the US Air Force is already being sued for reverse engineering. But you're right, it's not as appropriate an application of the DMCA as protecting us from recycled toner cartridges is. What was I thinking?

http://news.com.com/2117-1039-1020501.html
Verizon Wireless Chief Executive Denny Strigl said Tuesday that unlike rivals, Verizon won't collect monthly or one-time fees from subscribers who want to keep their original telephone number after switching carriers.

Sorry for the following rant, but I've been in this industry long enough to know how it works.

First of all, saying the Xbox is the future is just fanboyism as the article totally lacks the journalism and the facts to support it.

In fact, even saying the Xbox is #2 is really the typical short-sighted american view of the market. The videogame industry is worldwide, and as such, you really need to view the market in total console and software sales. Xbox and GCN are actually exchanging #2 and #3 in total sales worldwide several times each quarter. But this is not actually the point, the point is that even if they were a solid #2, they are still a failure in terms of their own expectations.

Microsoft has made a lot of artificial gimmicks to support the Xbox in the market, and the lack of profits on the Xbox division should be enough for anybody to see that. They expected to be able to snatch most of the PS2 market within one generation and there is simply no sign of them being able to do that, even when spending billions in marketing and development, severely undercutting the price of the Xbox (losing upwards more than $150 per machine), sacrificing royalties and/or explicitely giving money to developers for exclusive games and features, or outright buying them.

I'm not saying which of the Xbox, GCN or PS2 are the most powerful, or has the best games, or yadda yadda. Pure and simple facts, see the Microsoft press releases regarding the Xbox before entering the market. You'll see that they completely ignore Nintendo, and regard Sony as their target and sole rival. The sad truth is, they are way far behind their own forecasts and they haven't captured but a tiny fraction of the supposedly huge market they would conquer in this generation. They are struggling with millions in revenue, but not a penny of profit, fighting for #2 with a company they chose to ignore.

And no, forecasts were not optimistic some long ago. It's annoying how anybody with Internet access can't even make a simple article without checking the facts.

This and this are some of the first news regarding Xbox, check that PS2 is the console mentioned as its target and Gamecube is quite simply ignored.

I ask... Is Xbox really "teh fu7ur3"? Seriously, had not Microsoft budgeted such a huge amount of money for this venture, the Xbox would never survive. And it's quite a waste of money not to be in #1 after all.

RIM took the same device and gave it two product names, the 7210 and the 7230. Each are precisely the same and the 7230 is likely never to be carried by another company anyway (as RIM will make them specific for the carrier's needs then slap different number variation on it to distinguish the difference). I'd recommend anyone getting one to get the 7210 on AT&T Wireless as you won't have to deal with the crappy coverage that has become synonymous with the T-Mobile name. I got mine this last week, am not using the phone function, and still am at 65% battery left! Related reading: http://news.com.com/2100-1041-5063352.html

This isn't really new -- check out this story I wrote for CNet/ZDNet over a year ago.

In the words of Bullwinkle "this time, for sure!"

Hey, it's not the size that counts!

Actually, it is the size that counts. CNET News ran an article on the limits of hard drive size. They mentioned that the future business for these companies could be to work towards making hard drives that are smaller (and smaller, and smaller...)

Hey, it's not the size that counts!

Actually, it is the size that counts. CNET News ran an article on the limits of hard drive size. They mentioned that the future business for these companies could be to work towards making hard drives that are smaller (and smaller, and smaller...)

This is a copy of a message I sent to a mailing list some time back. They are the guidelines I use when updating my Windows system.

______________________

Some tricks -- mostly born out of antipathy and paranoia -- on dealing with Windoze Update:

• Never accept the default update selections as, in true Micros~1 tradition, they're always wrong. Deselect everything and then select only those pieces you want/need.
• Never download HW device drivers from Microsoft. Always get them from the HW vendor. The vendor knows more about supporting their own hardware than MS possibly could, so it makes little sense to get them from MS. MS might also take it upon themselves to slip in copy protection measures, which you don't want.
• Don't update DirectX through Windows Update; it does not and never has worked. Instead, download separately the very large DirectX update package from Microsoft and install it by hand.
• Don't install the next major version of Internet Explorer, as it's sure to disrupt your system. EXCEPTION: If you're using IE5, you should patch to IE v5.5. IE5 had boatloads of bugs (quelle surprise) which have mostly been addressed in 5.5.
• Don't install the next major version of Windows Media Player. This is where Microsoft's copy protection and usage monitoring measures will first appear in earnest, which you don't want to support. Also, it's not a very good player; there are better free ones available.
• Do download security updates, but be wary of such updates for Windows Media, as Microsoft are trying to change the definition of the word, "security."

Other things you might want to do:

• Unless you are using the calendar/scheduling system, there is absolutely no reason for you to be using Outlook/Outlook Express, and every reason not to. Delete it. With extreme prejudice.
• Download and install Mozilla. It rocks.
• Download the DivX ;-) video codec. You can also install their player, but you don't need to; the codec is usable by any application.
• Download and run RegClean.exe. It's a bit tough to find, but it's a good tool for cleaning the fluff out of the registry from time to time.
• Download and install VirtuaWin, a virtual desktop manager for Windows. This increases the utility of the Windows desktop ten-fold. I hate to tell people about it since it makes Windows tremendously more useful. (It's so nifty, I expect Microsoft to "invent" it in the next major Windows release.)

Although I mostly live in Win2K (when I'm not in Linux or BeOS), I have a Win98 partition that's still working fine without a single re-install. Basically, if you take a minimalist approach, and presume Microsoft to be an untrustworthy/unreliable source, you can greatly extend the life of your Windows installation.

Schwab

Let me suggest you all email HP

I still remember when Boies represented Napster, he had an argument that supposedly would cause RIAA to lose ability to enforce their copyright:

Slashdot article from back then: Boies: Music Industry Could Lose Copyright

The CNET article linked from the above Slashdot article: Napster: Downloading music for free is legal

Of course, back then we all thought it was The Second Coming when The One Who Struck Down Microsoft discovered a shrewd loophole that would save Napster. Hah! We all know what happened there...

I hope his cute loopholes fail him again this time around...

1. Use the Chewbacca defense.
2. ???
3. Report Profit!

The news story is kind of tragicomic, McBribe says "We intend to use this capital to continue our intellectual property protection and licensing initiative..."

I wish all their customers would simply stop giving them money. I know my company has; we've ditched using the products that ran on the SCO platform, but that's only about 60-70 licenses. The rest of you need to pony-up!

For a good example of a portability, check out this kind of portable. Just about anything can be portable these days.

If you RTFA, you would see this link: http://news.com.com/2100-1006-983593.html?tag=nl

Really?

How exactly are they leveraging their monopoly to do this? Windows doesn't come with anything related to Hotmail or MSN, idiot.

You are an ignorant turd, aren't you? Windows puts MSN icons on desktops, they make MSN the ad-splattering homepage for IE, they repeatedly ask if you have, or want to sign up for, a Hotmail account. Try reading this before you make more of a fool of yourself.

Exactly. Neither MSN or Hotmail are bundled, so they're irrelevant, and you're completely incapable of thought.

You are so incredibly stupid that it is no wonder that you post anonymously. If you had read the article, you would have seen that it said: It is consumer email in an early iteration, and our investment in the consumer space is now focused around Hotmail and MSN. That's where we're putting the emphasis in terms of new investment and new development work."

That means that Hotmail or MSN sign-up will be a big part of Windows install, that both MSN and Hotmail will be even more prominently pushed through IE (remember, IE ships with MSN as its homepage), and consumers will be left to either do the easy thing and sign up for MSN/Hotmail or try to hunt down an e-mail client and another service.

You're completely ignorant of the common user. Most common users I know are smarting than you, even, because at least they're capable of rational thought.

You wouldn't know an intelligent person if they hit you in the face -- and I'd like to be the guy to prove that. You calling me stupid is like Woody Allen calling Arnold Schwarzenegger wimpy.

OE was bundled,

And won't be any more.

that's how it's relevant to your post.

Wrong. We are talking about what happens now that OE is End Of Life, not what Microsoft did in the past.

MSN and Hotmail are services, so can't be bundled

Yes, services can be bundled with the OS. When the install asks if you want to sign up for a Hotmail account, the browser's homepage is an ad for MSN, the desktop includes a sign-up-for-MSN icon, and the system automatically starts up MSN Messenger, that's pushing the services down the users' throats and leveraging the monopoly power of Windows to do so. Are you even aware that:

AOL made a deal with Compaq to place an AOL icon on the desktop, and pay Compaq $35 for each AOL account sign-up it generated. In response, Microsoft announced that any OEM who put icons on the desktop must also put on an icon for MSN (Microsoft's service that competes with AOL) and Microsoft Media Player. That put AOL in the position of paying for Microsoft's advertising. Compaq stated that they will have no choice but to comply because of Microsoft's monopoly power. The Justice Department even investigated this as part of their anti-trust case against Microsoft.

Now go away little boy.

Jboss will likely be certified by the time panther ships "update Java creator Sun Microsystems has made an important compliance test available to JBoss Group, the latest maneuver in an ongoing tussle between the industry giant and the upstart open-source software company.

Sun last week offered JBoss Group the opportunity to license a set of testing tools to see if JBoss software adheres to the Sun-sanctioned Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) specification, according to Sun executives. If the JBoss Group's Java server software passes the compliance test, it can gain certification of J2EE compliance. " from News.com.com article from yesterday

He looks like a suit to me, except he has replaced his papers with something more (or less) effective.

BitHerder,

It doesn't trouble you one bit that Mr. Austin is being jailed for running just a simple website that has never served up anything more dangerous than ideas. I can't think of a single, better way to "peaceable assemble," which is another Constitutionally guaranteed freedom.

It is our Constitution which makes the United States of America the greatest country, I don't understand why you would want to make fun of an American, who is for some reason, not protected by our fundamental American freedoms.

For anyone who cares, CNet has a follow-up and interview here:

A Webmaster's 25th hour

But if the RIAA condemned only the "guilty" and didn't make stupid mistakes caused by their automated scanning systems, it still would not be okay to demand ludicrous sums of money from music sharers in court.

Back during the days of prohibition, bootlegging was a huge industry. Sure it was "legally" incorrect but did that stop them? Nope. Gangsters made tons of money and often killed those who got in the way. I wonder if the mafia somehow got involved with the whole DMCA bit if the RIAA would cower away in fear or use it as yet another excuse to imprison random Kazaa users.

Well, seeing that you're from SCO, you probably know better about how many developers are in SCO than any outsider. I gathered my fact, and what I know about it, most of the former developers are laid off. SCO Lays off 190 Saying that they "don't employ any developer" is just an overstatement. Well what the hell, as long as people get the idea. But again, seeing where you're from, most comments on this story will be classified by you as "crap", "emotional" and "inaccurate" anyway. I'll let the court decide whether I'm "running my mouth", and, I hope you sell your stocks in time.

According to a this article , "Efficeon" was chosen because the former name violated the trademarks of an animation company, Hanna-Barbara. Strange, because these are unrelated products.

Transmeta management should have labeled the new chip "Loser-on" instead of "Efficeon". Last quarter, Transmeta lost $22 million dollars on sales of $5.1 million, according to "High stakes for Transmeta's new chip" by CNet. Transmeta does not have the resources to compete against either AMD or Intel. Shortly after Transmeta annouced its first chips, Intel accelerated development of low-power chips and produced Centrino, which significantly reduced Transmeta's marketshare. AMD recently purchased the low-power-embedded-80x86 division of National Semiconductor; AMD is clearly accelerating its own development of low-power chips. Please read "AMD scoops up National Semi unit" by CNet. In summary, Transmeta is heading for bankruptcy, and the managers who lead Transmeta to an IPO are laughing at the stupid investors who drove up its stock in 2000.

Transmeta management should have labeled the new chip "Loser-on" instead of "Efficeon". Last quarter, Transmeta lost $22 million dollars on sales of $5.1 million, according to "High stakes for Transmeta's new chip" by CNet. Transmeta does not have the resources to compete against either AMD or Intel. Shortly after Transmeta annouced its first chips, Intel accelerated development of low-power chips and produced Centrino, which significantly reduced Transmeta's marketshare. AMD recently purchased the low-power-embedded-80x86 division of National Semiconductor; AMD is clearly accelerating its own development of low-power chips. Please read "AMD scoops up National Semi unit" by CNet. In summary, Transmeta is heading for bankruptcy, and the managers who lead Transmeta to an IPO are laughing at the stupid investors who drove up its stock in 2000.

"Has anyone else ran into this with good (or even bad) outcomes?"

Here's one example from earlier this month:

RIAA's scare tactics bound to backfire

We already saw this happen earlier this year, when the RIAA was forced to apologize to a Pennsylvania State University professor for sending him and dozens of other people legal warning saying that they were violating federal copyright law. The RIAA's automated program apparently confused two separate pieces of information--a legal MP3 file and a directory named "usher"--and concluded there was an illegal copy of a song by the musician Usher.

Also, from the /. Interview withMichael O'Leary, Deputy Chief for Intellectual Property at the DoJ:

9) "... under penalty of perjury ..." - by OWJones
In copyright law, 17 USC Section 512(c)(3)(vi) states that all notifications of copyright violations sent to ISPs must contain

A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed.
(emphasis mine).
Do you know of any cases in which the sender of an invalid takedown notice -- such as the RIAA claiming Penn State University Emeritus Professor Peter Usher's lecture on radio-selected quasars was, in fact, an mp3 from the musician Usher -- has been successfully charged with perjury? Or do you allow copyright holders some "fudge factor" with the perjury aspect, since

1. It was an mp3.
2. It did have the name of an RIAA-represented artist in the title, and
3. It was at a university.
If copyright holders are allowed leeway, can we expect to see similarly loose definitions of perjury creep into the legal system? If the police are looking for a "Caucasian male, age 50-60, bald, 200-225 pounds," can I testify in a court of law that the 18 year-old caucasian male with a ponytail, weighing 140-150 pounds, is in fact the suspect since he is, after all, a caucasian male?
I realize that's more than one question and that they're slightly loaded, but I'd appreciate any comments on how seriously the DoJ takes the perjury clause of the takedown notices.

O'Leary:
Your question raises an important point. We feel strongly that everyone should comply with the requirements of all laws. Legal process under the DMCA or any other provision of law should be undertaken with the utmost care and good faith. Failure to do so undermines the credibility and effectiveness of our legal system.

Having said that, it appears your interpretation of the language in 512 (c)(3)(vi) is in error. The phrase "under penalty of perjury," applies to the representation that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the copyright owner. It does not apply to the accuracy of the information about the alleged infringement. Quoting federal district Judge Bates in Verizon v. RIAA, The DMCA also requires a person seeking a subpoena to state, under penalty of perjury, that he is authorized to act on behalf of the copyright owner, 257 F. Supp.2d 244, at 262. In other words, the perjury clause may be violated if you seek a DMCA subpoena without the authorization of the copyright owner.

We are unaware of any prosecutions for violating this provision of the DMCA at this time.

They will simply fire the guy that sent out the mesage. It is probably the "same" temp employee the RIAA fired for the same thing. Damn, he's a real fuckup. Maybe he can pull a Kenneth Lay "I do not recall" when asked if he sent them.

I suppose it's too much to point out that this worm exploits a vulnerability that's already been patched by Microsoft, so that only lazy or incompetent admins are going to get hit by it.

I also suppose it's too much to suggest that any fool who has TCP 135-139, and TCP 445 exposed to the public Internet is an utter idiot who deserves to be fired, stoned, burned, crucified, sterilized and beheaded.

But hey! The solution is open source, right? I mean, no Linux admin would ever leave an unpatched service running for weeks after a fix has been released, would they?

Just keeping the Microsoft bashers honest here. It's not so much the OS's fault as it is the lazy, incompetent admins that are running the server. And Linux, BSD, and Mac boxes have their fair share of incompetents as well. Just run over to SecurityFocus and see how many exploits are available on any standard distribution or commercial OS that's out there. All of 'em have plenty of holes.

I think something like what Kaltix is trying has a better chance of replacing Google. However I don't see that happening either. I just think Google will learn from the user based systems

Great, now I am gonna read this tutorial, learn Tivoli and apply for a job with Lego. If you don't know what I am talking about, check this story on eWeek.

-- Sig
TODAY'S REJECTED STORY:
This story on Reuters says that Linux is gaining ground in India and according to RedHat, about 10 percent of India's personal computers will be sold with Linux rather than Microsoft operating systems by March, 2004. Besides the plain switch of desktop operating systems to Linux, analysts say the bigger worry for Microsoft is the growing use of Linux among India's pool of an estimated 400,000 software developers, many of whom churn out code for giants such as General Motors and American Express. CNET , ZDNet and Hindustan Times are running related stories on the rapid growth of Linux in Asia.

Of course, the Brits will want to call it "loo"... and it seems Microsoft would agree.

One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered Google community when IDC confirmed that Google market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all web searches. Coming on the heels of a recent Netcraft survey which plainly states that Google has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. Google is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by Yahoo's failure to renew its exclusive deal with Google.

You don't need to be a Kreskin to predict Google's future. The hand writing is on the wall: Google faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for Google because Google is dying. Things are looking very bad for Google. As many of us are already aware, Google continues to lose market share. Red ink flows like a river of blood.

Google search is the most endangered of them all, having lost most of its core affiliates. The sudden and unpleasant departures of Yahoo and AOL only serve to underscore the point more clearly. There can no longer be any doubt: Google is dying.

Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.

Google.com founder Sergey Brin states that there are 7000 users of Google. How many users of Verity are there? Let's see. The number of Google versus Verity posts on USENET is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 7000/5 = 1400 Verity users. AskJeeves posts on USENET are about half of the volume of Verity posts. Therefore there are about 700 users of Inktomi. A recent article put Teoma at about 80 percent of the search engine market. Therefore there are (7000+1400+700)*4 = 36400 Google users. This is consistent with the number of Google USENET posts.

Due to the troubles of Google News, abysmal sales and so on, Google is going out of business and will probably be taken over by idealab! who operate another troubled search engine. Now Inktomi is also dead, its corpse turned over to yet another charnel house.

All major surveys show that Google has steadily declined in market share. Google is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If Google is to survive at all it will be among search engine dilettante dabblers. Google continues to decay. Nothing short of a miracle could save it at this point in time. For all practical p

1. The Taiwanese have invested more than $50 billion into more than 50,000 businesses in mainland China. How did the Taiwanese achieve this state of affairs? Shortly after the Tienanmen Square incident in 1990, the American government and American businesses froze or reduced investments in China. The Taiwanese seized this window of opportunity and poured financial and technological investments into mainland China. The Taiwanese completely thwarted American attempts at using economic sanctions to force the Chinese government improve its human-rights record. Afterwards, Taiwanese investments skyrocketed to their current level.
2. The Chinese son of the chairman of a powerful conglomerate in Taiwan has joined with the son of Jiang Zemin, the butcher of Tibet, to build an advanced silicon-wafer factory in Shanghai. (reference: "Sons of prominent Chinese team up on chip venture")
3. Senior Chinese military officials retired from the Taiwanese military have gone to mainland China and given military secrets about the American F-16 fighter jet to the Beijing government. (reference: "Military secrets on sale to China")
4. The Wall Street Journal reports that the majority of American spies who steal sensitive computer and military technology (like microprocessor blueprints) to give to mainland China are actually born and raised in Taiwan. Both spies mentioned in "Two Men Arrested for Planning to Smuggle High-Tech Encryption Devices to China" are born and raised in Taiwan.

We Americans should not kid ourselves. The Taiwanese strongly support mainland China. The Taiwanese give to mainland China any money or technology that we Americans refuse to give.

When we apply economic sanctions against mainland China, we must also apply the same sanctions against Taiwan. In our pursuit of human rights, when we boycott products that are made in China, we must also boycott products that are made in Taiwan. Specifically, when we boycott notebook computers made in China, we must also boycott notebook computers made in Taiwan. As the article notes, computers "made in Taiwan" are really "made in China".

We must immediately stop selling weapons to Taiwan. Taiwan is a very serious security risk to the United States of America (USA). Since 2000 May, the FBI has placed Taiwan on the list of nations that are prone to steal sensitive military and commercial technology from American national laboratories and companies. Please read "Reno calls Taiwan an intelligence threat". See point #4 above.

The aforementioned facts are quite shocking since many folks in the SlashDot community are reading these facts for the first time. It is understandable. The Taiwanese government has annually paid about $2 million to lobbying firms like "Cassidy & Associates" to peddle influence in the American government. (reference: Big Business Comes to Aid of China") Indeed, do you remember Charlie Trie, John Huang, and Johnny Chung? They were the key figures in the financial scandal that rocked the Democratic Party and were accused of bribing American officials. Both John Huang and Johnny Chung were born or raised in Taiwan.

If all these facts and the CNet article about Chinese laptops do not convince you that the Taiwanese support mainland China, then consider this tidbit. The Taiwanese constitution

1. The Taiwanese have invested more than $50 billion into more than 50,000 businesses in mainland China. How did the Taiwanese achieve this state of affairs? Shortly after the Tienanmen Square incident in 1990, the American government and American businesses froze or reduced investments in China. The Taiwanese seized this window of opportunity and poured financial and technological investments into mainland China. The Taiwanese completely thwarted American attempts at using economic sanctions to force the Chinese government improve its human-rights record. Afterwards, Taiwanese investments skyrocketed to their current level.
2. The Chinese son of the chairman of a powerful conglomerate in Taiwan has joined with the son of Jiang Zemin, the butcher of Tibet, to build an advanced silicon-wafer factory in Shanghai. (reference: "Sons of prominent Chinese team up on chip venture")
3. Senior Chinese military officials retired from the Taiwanese military have gone to mainland China and given military secrets about the American F-16 fighter jet to the Beijing government. (reference: "Military secrets on sale to China")
4. The Wall Street Journal reports that the majority of American spies who steal sensitive computer and military technology (like microprocessor blueprints) to give to mainland China are actually born and raised in Taiwan. Both spies mentioned in "Two Men Arrested for Planning to Smuggle High-Tech Encryption Devices to China" are born and raised in Taiwan.

We Americans should not kid ourselves. The Taiwanese strongly support mainland China. The Taiwanese give to mainland China any money or technology that we Americans refuse to give.

When we apply economic sanctions against mainland China, we must also apply the same sanctions against Taiwan. In our pursuit of human rights, when we boycott products that are made in China, we must also boycott products that are made in Taiwan. Specifically, when we boycott notebook computers made in China, we must also boycott notebook computers made in Taiwan. As the article notes, computers "made in Taiwan" are really "made in China".

We must immediately stop selling weapons to Taiwan. Taiwan is a very serious security risk to the United States of America (USA). Since 2000 May, the FBI has placed Taiwan on the list of nations that are prone to steal sensitive military and commercial technology from American national laboratories and companies. Please read "Reno calls Taiwan an intelligence threat". See point #4 above.

The aforementioned facts are quite shocking since many folks in the SlashDot community are reading these facts for the first time. It is understandable. The Taiwanese government has annually paid about $2 million to lobbying firms like "Cassidy & Associates" to peddle influence in the American government. (reference: Big Business Comes to Aid of China") Indeed, do you remember Charlie Trie, John Huang, and Johnny Chung? They were the key figures in the financial scandal that rocked the Democratic Party and were accused of bribing American officials. Both John Huang and Johnny Chung were born or raised in Taiwan.

If all these facts and the CNet article about Chinese laptops do not convince you that the Taiwanese support mainland China, then consider this tidbit. The Taiwanese constitution

I dont see to many "Made in China" laptops at the stores here in Canada. The one i am typing this on is made in Japan (Toshiba satellite) and another major laptop brand Dell has all its production facilities in US except maybe the desktop units for the japanese market.

Contrary to the popular belief, the SCO case never was and never will be about the GPL.

The original suit wasn't about the GPL. However, one of the specific points of of IBM's countersuit is that SCO distributed Linux under the GPL and thus removed any claim they may have otherwise have had to exclusive ownership of parts of the code in the Linux kernel. This IS a direct test of the GPL, and it will likely be one of the first issues decided since, if it stands, it makes all of the other issues in the suit irrelevant.

On April 24, 2000, the writer Harlan Ellison filed suit against an individual named Stephen Robertson, a Usenet company named RemarQ, and AOL over four of Harlan Ellison's stories posted on Usenet by Stephen Robertson.

If I understand it correctly, AOL was sued only because that happened to be the service provider of the two who tracked down the identity of Stephen Robertson.

Read about it here

Here's a 2002 story on zdnet about it

The following is from this article:

In April, 2000, Harlan Ellison was told that an individual using the screen name and e-mail address shaker@tco.net was scanning stories by him and other writers and posting them to a newsgroup called alt.binaries.e-book. (The designation alt.binaries means that it is a newsgroup where files of material are exchanged; there is relatively little discussion among the participants.) John Miller (former SFWA(R) secretary) and Susan Parris assisted in tracking the works which were copied to the newsgroup, which they received as part of the subscription to America Online. Four of Harlans stories, all apparently scanned from copies of the Nebula Awards(R) anthologies, were identified as copied by Shaker.

We learned that Shaker was actually Stephen Robertson, a 40-year-old living with his parents in Red Bluff, California. Although Robertsons ISP was Tehama County Online, TCO outsourced its newsgroup services to RemarQ Communties, Inc. TCO cooperated by blocking Shakers account immediately upon notice of the infringing activities and revealing the services provided by RemarQ and was therefore not included in the lawsuit which followed.

The original complaint was filed on April 24, 2000. Stephen Robertson settled with Harlan almost immediately and is no longer a part of the case except for evidence he may have to provide during discovery and trial. The complaint was amended in late May and the Court permitted the filing and service of a second amended complaint in October.

We faced a series of procedural challenges to the complaint prior to answer by either AOL or RemarQ and its new parent company Critical Path, but we have prevailed and are now out of the pleading stage and facing the discovery phase.

AOLs original motion for dismissal or summary judgment on the first amended complaint was heard in July, and resulted in a temporary partial victory for AOL. However, the effect of this early ruling in favor of summary judgment on the copyright allegations has been essentially overruled by the Courts more recent ruling on AOLs motion to dismiss, or in the alternative for a more definite statement, the second amended complaint, which was heard in January and resolved in Harlans favor. AOLs answer to the second amended complaint was due on February 5, 2001.

RemarQ/Critical paths original motion to dismiss or in the alternative for summary judgment on the first amended complaint was scheduled for hearing and moved several times before being declared moot by the Court when granting leave to plaintiff to file the second amended complaint at the end of October. [Note: RemarQ provides its Usenet newsgroup services under the name SuperNews; SuperNews remains one of the prime origination news servers for illegal material posted to alt.binaries.e-book.] RemarQ/Critical Paths motion to dismiss or in the alternative for summary judgment on the second amended complaint was denied by the Court in January. RemarQ/Critical Path answered the second amended complaint on January 26, 2001.

In its order of January 12, 2001, the Court demonstrates a better, but not complete, understanding of the DMCA than evidenced in July. What is important about this ruling is that it sets ou

Tech support line puts him on hold for a loooonngg time. He gets to hear the music he _was_ going to download, while he waits. Why is he calling "Tech Support"? Why, he's trying to solve this problem while he is at work, and can't actually go back to the store and walk in with the entire boxen in tow. (Now we all know that's why we have tech support phone numbers, and why the caller knows so little, his _machine_ is miles away from his calling location, and his _memory_ of the problem is just as far away, too.)

Our machines are made by the millions in the far corners of the known world, and sold to anyone with the $$, regardless of their "skill level". No wonder Tech Support is "blown out of the water" by all the calls from people "new to computers".

Nice marketing ploy, however, appealing to the wants/desires of Joe Sixpack with "Download and Burn your Own Movies and Songs" technology in todays PC's. (Don't forget the ability to run Everquest, too.)

If the average person wanted to use PC's for educational purposes rather than as a "party (as in get-drunk and dance all nite) machine", then the PC's for sale would be set up differently, I suppose, and perhaps Tech Support would have a better crowd to deal with.

Oh, I know, I have left out "Uncle Fred" and his need to have extremely high-tech machinery to process his e-mail and digital photographs of his grandkids. _He_ doesn't have to call Tech Support from work, because he hasn't been able to work for 7 years, ever since his smoking habit caused his heart disease and lung problems. He's home all day, and can spend _hours_ on the phone with Tech Support, getting filled in on everything electronic that's happened since WWII, when he was stationed on a ship that actually had a superhetrodyne radio receiver. That busy signal that Joe Sixpack gets? Well, it's because Tech Support is tied up with Uncle Fred.

(One day soon, someone at Walmart will have "one-to-many" and put Linux PC's on the shelf at your local country-fried Walmart Store, and Tech Support will go ballistic.)

This isn't news -- it's a daily occurence. However, netizens and hackers find break-ins newsworthy when the database is larger and/or more sensitive. The greater the target's security investment, the greater the challenge. You can bet that copies of this database have already been tarballed, bzipped and scp'd to 50 countries.

If you place first in a 500 lap race, there is more associated with that victory than a shorter 100 lap race. Why? Time investment necessary to be victorious, equipment and bandwidth required. Concentration needed. Similarly, if a company has stateful inspection firewalls, network and host-based intrusion detection, regular vulnerability assessment and a proactive group of sysadmins and security experts protecting the network -- and you can still break in -- that's newsworthy. Good examples of truly newsworthy break-ins would be Yahoo! News Hacked, and FBI Investigating Qualcomm Hacker.

Here we have an article about yet another internal employee that was layed off and screwed around with the databases in retaliation (YAIETWLOASAWTDIR). Sure it's a problem, but it is not insurmountable. Just how common is this problem? Check out my recent blog entry, "Sacked staff turn to sabotage because they still have access."