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I tried to install Kubuntu on a software RAID array...

I've had a related experience with software RAID and loss of data. What a miserable experience that was. Let's just say that I am never again going to attempt an upgrade where any live filesystem is using software RAID (unless I truly don't care whether I lose the lot). And now back to the topic at hand.

...it's clear that you think evolution produces no predictions and is not falsifiable.

Broadly speaking, you are correct. The "Message Theory" book spends quite some time criticising the theory on this front. The blog I linked to in that other post does a good job (IMO) of criticising the very proposed falsifications to which you link. As for Darwin's remarks, I don't believe that support for his theory would buckle in the slightest under such evidence. After all, the situation he describes could easily be attained under a scenario of neutral evolution, don't you think? Under that explanation, the structure wouldn't have evolved for the other species, but just evolved as a matter of neutral drift. We could even argue that this benefit to the other species may have resulted in a symbiotic benefit of some sort in return, and then we have a selective benefit.

I think that evolution is almost infinitely adaptable like this, and is thus unfalsifiable. Evolutionists are willing to claim that certain scenarios would invalidate the theory, but in practice it's just certain specifics that get abandoned in the face of such evidence -- if anything. The broad, naturalistic shape remains the same.

Actually, I wrote an essay in 2005 on the subject of creation/evolution and the distinction between science and metaphysics. I've just re-read it, and I'd wind up repeating a fair slab of it here in response to much of what you say. Perhaps you'd care to read Don't Shoot the Creationist and see how much it clears up my position for you. Certain of your questions aren't so directly relevant to it, though, and I'll try to answer them here.

I noticed your link to "Message Theory"...

I do so having read the book. I probably still have it here somewhere. Message theory in short is the hypothesis that life was designed specifically to look as though it (a) was not the product of a natural process, and (b) was the product of a single designer. The author discusses how these design goals conflict: emphasising the unity of design can lend weight to the "all life is related" hypothesis present in evolution; emphasising the differences in design can lend weight to the "multiple creators" hypothesis. Much of the evidence for evolution can also be presented as evidence for the "single designer" hypothesis; the interesting part is the "not a natural process" hypothesis, which is where it diametrically opposes evolution.

Of course this re-raises the interesting question as to whether we can discern, scientifically, the difference between a natural process and one that involved agencies not in evidence (like a creator, or a factory, or whatever). As we've seen in this very discussion, strongly held metaphysical beliefs tend to substitute for evidence. Further, although we recognise manufactured products in our daily lives, we don't seem to have any agreement on whether life looks like such a thing. The evolutionist says that life resembles a smooth pebble, easily explained by natural processes; the creationist says that life resembles a stone arrowhead, shaped by a force with a purpose in mind. How do you tell the difference?

...Sagan's heroine discovers an obvious, indisputable message encoded in the digits of pi.

For the sake of scope containment, I'm not going to discuss this from any angle, other than to say

Creationism is not science because it does not predict anything.

So if someone could come up with a specific account of creation which made specific predictions, that would qualify as science? Does Message Theory qualify?

Evolution predicted the existence of genetics...

In what sense of "predict?" Darwin worked within the existing model of pangenesis. Mendel's discoveries and the emergence of modern genetics meant that it was necessary to revise Darwinian evolution into Neo-Darwinian evolution, in which traits were generated through mutation rather than acquired by effort (such as stretching the neck). So not only did Darwinian evolution not predict genetics, it had to be modified to be compatible with it. Where's the predictive element in that?

On the broader subject of "evolution predicts", I did a little search because I've rarely seen anyone praise evolution for its predictive ability (as opposed to its explanatory power). In doing so, I found a critique of the matter in a blog which I think is worth reading. The most directly relevant entry is here, but read the prior and latter entries if you have the time, since they contribute to the overall argument.

Australia passed a similar law about five years ago. Commentary here. Short version: ignoring for the moment the question of whether this is a case of over-governing, cutting off the point of payment is a really clever and effective way to get a legislative grip on the situation. You can't regulate a gambling establishment that's beyond your borders, but you can prevent the local banks from paying them, and that works just as well.

This page does quite a nice job showing that even with 17 billion galaxies filled with 17 billion planets, each with 17 billion monkeys hammering away, the odds are so infinitesimally small that its safe to say its impossible.

Slow news day, huh? Not surprising. Well, if this sort of thing interests you, you may also like my short article on the Protestant Laziness Ethic .

Monkeys and Typewriters aren't likely to produce anything meaningful at all in an information space as sparsely populated as that of "functional computer programs" and "meaningful language". Important disclosure: before you go clicking on that link, be aware that the conclusion of the article is supportive of creationism. The guts of the article is pure mathematics disguised as humour, but I know how touchy the average Slashdotter is about creationists, so don't say I tried to preach at you.

There are quite a few other probability-related articles on Nutters, such as Monkeys and the Lottery , Proverbial Probability Problems , and What a coincidence! .

Monkeys and Typewriters aren't likely to produce anything meaningful at all in an information space as sparsely populated as that of "functional computer programs" and "meaningful language". Important disclosure: before you go clicking on that link, be aware that the conclusion of the article is supportive of creationism. The guts of the article is pure mathematics disguised as humour, but I know how touchy the average Slashdotter is about creationists, so don't say I tried to preach at you.

There are quite a few other probability-related articles on Nutters, such as Monkeys and the Lottery , Proverbial Probability Problems , and What a coincidence! .

Monkeys and Typewriters aren't likely to produce anything meaningful at all in an information space as sparsely populated as that of "functional computer programs" and "meaningful language". Important disclosure: before you go clicking on that link, be aware that the conclusion of the article is supportive of creationism. The guts of the article is pure mathematics disguised as humour, but I know how touchy the average Slashdotter is about creationists, so don't say I tried to preach at you.

There are quite a few other probability-related articles on Nutters, such as Monkeys and the Lottery , Proverbial Probability Problems , and What a coincidence! .

Monkeys and Typewriters aren't likely to produce anything meaningful at all in an information space as sparsely populated as that of "functional computer programs" and "meaningful language". Important disclosure: before you go clicking on that link, be aware that the conclusion of the article is supportive of creationism. The guts of the article is pure mathematics disguised as humour, but I know how touchy the average Slashdotter is about creationists, so don't say I tried to preach at you.

There are quite a few other probability-related articles on Nutters, such as Monkeys and the Lottery , Proverbial Probability Problems , and What a coincidence! .

Amen to that. And it's not always the industry newbie who's to blame. There are career programmers who've never worked any other way. And often those code cowboys are considered valuable for their ability to get code working rapidly. What's not seen, of course, is the maintenance nightmare they create in the same stroke.

On the matter of artificial scarcity in the DNS, you may find my "Cornucopia" idea interesting. It's in the category of crazy ideas that ought to be considered, even if only to break people out of an established mindset. (Also at my site.) The basic premiss of the idea: "What if every domain name you wanted was available?"

I think it's safer to view these things as "the sincere beliefs of the authors" (or, more cynically, "what the authors would like other people to believe"), rather than having any close correspondence with "truth" as such. That's not as big a problem as it may sound, because it's true of pretty much every written claim everywhere all the time, and anyone who tells you otherwise is, to borrow from The Princess Bride, selling something.

The philosopher John Stuart Mill had a solution for this kind of problem, which he wrote about in his essay, "On Liberty": make all conflicting viewpoints available. Let all sides present their case with argument and evidence. The way you sort it out is by evaluating the evidence and the arguments in much the same way that court cases are decided, except that the decision is made on an individual basis, rather than for all. The general approach can be summarised like so: it is better that one be at liberty to believe a falsehood than forced to believe a truth. (For discussion: do you agree or disagree with this statement? Why and to what extent?)

A relevant portion of Mill's "On Liberty" is currently quoted at Nutters.org if you care for a little more philosophical reading.

I could go on, but the thing I really want to say is don't reduce law to mathematics, at least not unless you understand a bit about law and the circumstances under which it is reasonable to do so. Failure to do this may result in embarrassingly bad reasoning.

I wouldn't give you a job anyway... since you can't seem to grasp basic grammar. Less vs. Fewer

I did a critique on this article, entitled "A Bad Argument Analysed". Basically this article contributes nothing towards thinking on software licensing at all (one way or the other), but it does serve as a useful example of sloppy thinking and shoddy rhetoric.

That logic just doesn't make sense. If I type a random bunch of characters, I *could* produce the works of Shakespeare.

Yes, you could. By attempting random combinations, you could achieve the proper result in about 3 times the amount of time it will take for the universe to reach its heat death. You can test the theory with this simulation. A quick search on Google also presents this math for the traditional Million Monkeys problem.

If I change a random gene, it *could* be beneficial.

It could be beneficial. Not because we know that it could be beneficial, but because we don't know enough about genetics to positively state that it absolutely would not be beneficial. This is similar to saying that it could be possible to time travel and violate causality. It could be true, but we don't know enough to make the statement one way or another.

How can you possibly argue that a random change can't be beneficial ever?

Actually, I argued that existing evidence suggests that random changes are never positive. While a heap of data doesn't qualify as proof, there is current zero evidence of an absolutely beneficial mutation. Until such a mutation can be isolated and identified, evolution by mutation is pure speculation. If evidence actually existed, then it could graduate to a theory.

Mutations that are positive are also far less obvious. If your child is slightly stronger than normal, would you notice?

Most people do notice. In fact my first child was born rather strong. It took four people to hold him when he was getting his shots. The question is, was it a mutation, or was it existing genetics? By sequencing samplings of the population, we are starting to isolate enough genes that we may soon be able to answer that. We've already identified genes for color, strength, obesity, etc. With any luck, we'll soon be able to know if positive mutations are a real phenomenon, or just wishful thinking.

If they have a crippling disability, on the other hand, you sure will.

Of course. "Bad" mutations are almost always obvious. The problem is that if positive mutations exist, then negative mutations must outweigh them by an overwhelming margin. We can induce mutations, but they always turn out either negative or settle as dormant genes.

Again, why? One example from agriculture doesn't prove anything. All it proves is that we don't know how to do it properly. That *may* be because it isn't possible but not necessarily.

It's hardly "one example". My colleagues of which I speak are PHDs in the field of genetics. They were not only educated in the field, but they dealt with genetics on a daily basis. All genetics data to date suggests that genetic manipulation is a zero sum game. That's why Eugenics can't work. You'll never get a race of "super-men", you'll only create a race of people who have traits you desire. How shallow are you willing to make your "super-men"? If you breed for intelligence, then strength may suffer. If you breed for strength, then intelligence may suffer. If you breed for height, then your people will have less lifting power. If you breed for shortness, then leverage will suffer. So on and so forth.

Ah, but i believe 2 in 4 are protected from malaria? Evolution has selected for the sickle-cell property because it provides an overall benefit for the group. African Americans still have the mutation but it is fading out (hence the lower prevalence). Evolution takes time, especially now that modern medical practices mean that many more sufferers survive.

Yet again, if this is a "good" mutation, why does it need to be bread out of the gene pool? "Micro-evolution" speculates that positive mutations crucial to the development of an organism must have occurred and remained. You didn't acquire lungs just so they could be bread out in six generations down the line, did you? No! The mutation must have become a standard part of the genome.

Less and Fewer.

It may sound unlikely but that doesn't mean it hasn't happened before.

Believe me, folks, if my site isn't safe, then nobody is. I figured I was a complete nobody in the anti-spam scene, and yet I was an early target! The Spamafia brooks no criticism: you will be driven off the web forcibly. Oh yeah, and my experience was that the police really don't have the resources to do anything about this. My ISP at the time didn't seem to care much, either. And there are more attacks that you probably haven't heard about. It's a war zone out there, folks.

Believe me, folks, if my site isn't safe, then nobody is. I figured I was a complete nobody in the anti-spam scene, and yet I was an early target! The Spamafia brooks no criticism: you will be driven off the web forcibly. Oh yeah, and my experience was that the police really don't have the resources to do anything about this. My ISP at the time didn't seem to care much, either. And there are more attacks that you probably haven't heard about. It's a war zone out there, folks.

If you want more of the story -- of why I'm suspicious of Intellectual Property Rights even now that I'm a free agent -- read on.

The only direct beneficiaries of Intellectual Property Laws are lawyers, judges, and legislators. Laws guarantee those jobs; everyone else is left to manipulate the legal environment to their advantage as best they can, to suit some related end.

I, for one, have been in a position where I would prefer not to have intellectual property rights, on the grounds that I've had to give them up to an employer without compensation. If the creations had been in the public domain at the outset, then I would have had as much right in them as anyone else, but when employment contracts dictate that all works created during the term of employment (including those created out of work hours, on your own equipment) belong to the company, then "intellectual property rights" become a rod for an author's back.

See the long version at The Trouble With Having Rights , or the slightly briefer and less formal version of the same theme at The Intellectual Slave .

I, for one, have been in a position where I would prefer not to have intellectual property rights, on the grounds that I've had to give them up to an employer without compensation. If the creations had been in the public domain at the outset, then I would have had as much right in them as anyone else, but when employment contracts dictate that all works created during the term of employment (including those created out of work hours, on your own equipment) belong to the company, then "intellectual property rights" become a rod for an author's back.

See the long version at The Trouble With Having Rights , or the slightly briefer and less formal version of the same theme at The Intellectual Slave .

But rather than waffle about it further, I'll provide a few links. Cringely spoke about micropayments some time ago ("Let's Get Small", "Paying the Piper"), and I wrote to him about the former, gaining a mention in the latter -- he thought that my observation about voluntary payments was particularly insightful. I document that correspondence in an article on my own website ("Fame and Money"), and I also wrote an essay critiquing a non-deterministic micropayment system by Ron Rivest ("Micropayments: Are Lotteries the Answer?") which ties in with the aforementioned bits.

But rather than waffle about it further, I'll provide a few links. Cringely spoke about micropayments some time ago ("Let's Get Small", "Paying the Piper"), and I wrote to him about the former, gaining a mention in the latter -- he thought that my observation about voluntary payments was particularly insightful. I document that correspondence in an article on my own website ("Fame and Money"), and I also wrote an essay critiquing a non-deterministic micropayment system by Ron Rivest ("Micropayments: Are Lotteries the Answer?") which ties in with the aforementioned bits.

You still don't get it. If in fact pi is normal (and the evidence leans this way now), it is in fact *certain* that a 500x500 string of mostly zeros occurs in it somewhere.

Actually I do get it, I just didn't express myself accurately. What I meant was that that 500x500 string of mostly zeroes is staggeringly unlikely to occur in the first trillion digits. In fact, using one of the pi digit searches out there, I was able to determine that even a string of just eight zeroes in a row never occurs in the first 100 million digits, and neither does my ten-digit phone number. And increasing the number of digits to 1.25 trillion only increases the odds by a factor of twelve or so, I think.

In fact, even the string "8479326669" (ASCII digits of "TO BE") never occurs in the first 100 million digits. Yes, all of Hamlet in ASCII would show up if we had enough digits, but it'd probably take more digits than there are particles in the universe and probably take longer than the expected age of the universe to find it using a linear search, even accounting for Moore's law.

My point is, it's unfathomable just how unlikely things can be. Do read The Mathematics of Monkeys and Shakespeare if you haven't. It's quite good, even (gasp!) despite its pro-God stance.

Chances are that if you look long and hard enough, widening your parameters for what's acceptable enough, you will find something.

Granted. Though a lot of people go from there into assuming that certain things are much more probable than they actually are. For example, though I haven't looked through the digits of pi itself, I feel pretty confident that no 500x500 string of mostly zeros occurs. In fact, the chances of it doing so are so astronomically slim that it would be easier to believe that an intelligent designer had put it there than that it occurred by chance.

The Mathematics of Monkeys and Shakespeare is one of my favorite articles to point intelligent readers to that believe that whole infinite number of monkeys typing would eventually produce Hamlet idea.

http://www.nutters.org/monkeys.html

Interesting reading.

http://www.nutters.org/monkeys.html

I have a somewhat different theory about the Microsoft attitude to the GPL. I think they fear the GPL because they fear that they will be trapped by it someday. Microsoft's culture is an extremely proprietary one: they guard their intellectual property with the covetousness of a dragon guarding its treasure hoard. I think they fear that someday some careless employee will incorporate tainted GPL code into a program, and they may then be obliged to share some of their treasure. Horrors! The old dragon wants to keep all of its treasure and acquire more at every opportunity, and the idea that this GPL code is out there with the intention of making them part with it is anathema to them.

I think that RMS is operating under a misapprehension if he sincerely thinks that the GPL is any realistic kind of defence against Microsoft. Given that it can't defend against embrace and extend, then what exactly does it defend against? Stallman uses the GPL as a tool of obstruction, not defence. (The GPL can be used in a defensive mode, but Stallman doesn't use it that way.) He wants the GPL to be a stumbling block to Microsoft: if they won't play by his rules, he wants it to be hard for them to gain any benefit from his code. Microsoft isn't intimidated by such defences, really, but they are appalled that a tool like the GPL can exist at all -- a tool the intent of which is to force them to share their hoard.

This, I think, is what Allchin meant when he called the GPL "un-American". Allchin is living in the Gordon Gekko Wall Street world of "greed is good". If greed is good, then Microsoft is a saint and the GPL is a tool of the devil, since its raison d'être is to enforce sharing, not selfishness. I think that Allchin was being entirely sincere, and that the concept of sharing intellectual property (as a good in its own right, as opposed to a means to the end of acquiring more property) evokes revulsion in members of the Microsoft subculture. The concept of being under a legal obligation to share, as the GPL would have it, must grate against every virtual fibre of their corporate being.

To put it another way, the "American way" (as I imagine Allchin sees it) is to be able to do as one damn well pleases with one's own property; to have an inalienable right to be selfish, or not, as one chooses. The GPL would take that choice from you (for the greater good). Microsoft have no problem with people choosing to give away their property if they want to do that, but the concept of revoking their divine right to be selfish with their own property, as and when they please, is appalling.

[The original log entry is currently hosted at a temporary URL. I realise that this story is probably just another case of April Fool irony, but I thought I'd make a serious comment anyhow since I had a ready-rolled post.]

In many peoples' minds this idea was discredited decades ago.

Yes, and that can be a bit of a problem, because it means that they won't listen to your arguments or even read the link that one provides as a supporting argument. From a simple epistemological perspective, you can be presented with as much evidence for design as you like and still deny that it is actually design, but merely something that has the appearance of design. This is Dawkins to a tee. But hell, even Dawkins tells us that stuff looks designed, and wasn't that what I said originally?

The point of my argument is that I don't believe we will be overtaken by machines because I believe in actual design rather than inevitable onward upward evolution which merely seems like design. In all cases of actual design, there is a lossy effect. You cannot design and build something which has more intelligence than you, because you had to use your intelligence in order to design and build it. Where is the extra intelligence going to come from in order to get a smarter end product?

Clearly Bert Bert forgot to evolve by natural selection.

Natural selection won't work. Let's assume that Bert Bert makes lots of replicas of himself and then picks the best one to take over the job. This will minimise the rate at which the system degrades. In order for actual improvement to take place, there has to be an improvement over the original. In the real world, this improvement is supposed to happen by chance, which seems a bit far-fetched, given that even relatively trivial things can't happen by chance. Without the supposed benefit of random changes, we are back to Bert Bert making a better design under his own steam, and if he can do that (I say that he can't, but if he could) then he doesn't need natural selection.

A stone axe cuts better than my hand does.

And so on. Yes, pretty much any example of a tool, right down to Ugg the Caveman walloping someone with a club-shaped lump of wood, disproves my theory if your assertion is relevant. Fortunately, it itsn't.

Even the earliest computers could perform mathematics faster and more reliably than a room full of accountants. That's why they were useful at all. But someone has to tell them what math to perform. And even where they make decisions about what math to perform, someone had to tell it how to make those decisions. And if we get programs to figure out how to make decisions on their own, then someone will have to have told them how to do that. See a pattern forming?

The only threat here is if a lower grade of intellect can be overcompensated by increased speed -- assuming that computers even would be able to out-do us in think-speed were they performing the same abstract mental tasks. It's not like we know enough about our own thought processes to tell how much CPU power they'd need. People tend to make the simplistic assumption that because computers can add numbers billions of times faster than they could, that the speed increase will scale up with the problem of general intelligence. Or maybe people just think that brains are the product of an undirected random process, and we can do better with electronics -- ironic, given that it's that very same randomly-evolved brain which thinks it can do better.

Like I say, if we face a threat from technology, it will probably be because we invent something lethal to ourselves or wreck the environment or stuff the gene pool or blow ourselves up. It will not be from producing the next step in evolution. That stuff is good for science fiction writing based on a theme of hubris, but it is not realistic.

The Mathematics of Monkeys and Shakespeare, or "Monkey Claims Copyright on Hamlet: Film at 11."

Some have suggested that this law was a bone thrown to Senator Harradine in order to get his vote on the GST legislation. That was a nice theory at the time, but we know it didn't work, because Harradine voted against the GST. On the whole, I get the feeling that we have the cart before the horse on this issue: the government wanted the legislation and rammed it through before Harradine lost his balance of power position precisely because they knew he'd vote for it. Harradine's position was always that the proposed law wasn't strong enough, but of course anything is better than nothing. The government really wanted this law, and I don't think we need introduce conspiracy theories to explain it when simple "stupidity" provides an adequate answer.

There's also the suggestion that the general press didn't give this story the airplay and column-space that it deserved because of some self-serving interests. No, I don't see the need for a conspiracy theory here either. Australians in general don't see the film ratings system as an invasion of their rights, and PM John Howard can legitimately claim popular support for the morality-based censorship system that exists. Senator Alston (the minister whose portfolio covers this area) is basically right when he says that this law is simply applying existing censorship laws to the Internet. This is why the whole thing isn't newsworthy, except for a little coverage of the protest marches. Most people buy the logic of our politicians in this matter. Most people simply don't understand that their logic is flawed to hell.

The average Slashdot reader knows that the whole concept of Internet censorship is ludicrous, but the broader public (and our illustrious political leaders) don't. Educating them (the general public, not the politicians -- politicians only want to know about political expediency, not technology) would be a long and slow process if we had to do it ourselves. I can only hope that the vast majority of them will find whatever mechanisms we are obliged to use to "clean up" the Internet for them a complete and utter nuisance. May access times slow, may prices rise, may quality of service in a general sense go to hell, just for a little while. Australians are just as wired as the US, and once the nearly-40% of Australians who use the 'net get sick of their ISP saying "sorry, but we have to do it because of the Broadcasting Act," we'll see how quickly this stupid law gets taken out, or at least cut down to size.

I think the majority of Australians would be in favour of a ratings system for the Internet if it could be done without other negative impact. They just don't understand that it's impossible. Once the price of enforcing this law becomes apparent, I think we will have general support for its abolition. Please, God, may the damage to industry and our global reputation be as little as possible. We are stupid and we deserve the fruits of our own stupidity, but may it be as brief as possible.

That's what copyrights are, enslavement of code.

Your own logic here is self-refuting. If copyright is enslavement of code, then copyleft is also enslavement of code because copyleft uses copyright as a mechanism.

Fortunately for you, you have merely misunderstood Stallman's argument. Stallman believes that copyright as a mechanism lends itself to evil uses more than to good, but his argument is not with copyright. Nor is he trying to free code, but rather people.

If we were to talk about "free software" in the natural English sense, we would either assume that it was like free as in zero cost, or free as in unrestricted. Stallman's "free software" is strictly neither of these since it sometimes costs money and always comes with a load of restrictions known as the GPL attached. This is Tom's gripe with the FSF: they are calling that which isn't that which is.

What the FSF is really peddling is cunningly restricted software which ensures that the majority of users will be as free as possible. The GPL restricts only those freedoms which you could use to interfere with the freedoms of others, but the essence of the GPL is its specific restrictions.

The GPL does two specific things to restrict freedom. One is that it forbids changes to the license terms. In order to redistribute GPL software (in modified or unmodified form), you must agree to abide by the GPL's license terms, which are in themselves a restriction on your freedoms. You must agree to surrender certain natural rights for the purposes of dealing with that particular piece of software. Contrast that with a public domain program which makes no such demands or restrictions on your freedom.

The second prong of the GPL attack is to demand that you make the source code of the program available (whether you have modified it or not). This protects everyone else from nasty people who want to spread binary-only copies of programs, thereby circumventing our right to read and modify the program.

Those points again for the people who missed them the first time. By agreeing to abide by the terms of the GPL (which is the only thing that gives you the right to redistribute GPL software, since copyright restricts redistribution by default), you agree to abide by the following restrictions on your personal freedom.

1. It requires that you redistribute the work and all works you derive from it under the GPL also, so that you may not increase the restrictions on others (by reinstating copying restrictions) or weakening the existing restrictions (so that point two might be violated).
2. It requires that you make source code available to your programs if you release them at all. Binary-only distribution is streng verboten.

Whether we as users and programmers are freer with the GPL or the Public Domain is an interesting philosophical question. I might even try to write an essay on it someday. (And while I'm here I'll plug my existing essay, Philosophies of Free Software and Intellectual Property .)

Posted by The Famous Brett Watson:

I've posted this link before, but it's as relevant as ever, and judging by my web logs most people haven't seen it yet. If you were hoping for something a little more substantial than this "feature", then I can't help you, but if you were looking for something a lot more substantial, then refer to my essay Philosophies of Free Software and Intellectual Property ; seventy kilobytes of HTML in which I lovingly beat the subject to death with a heavy, blunt object. Enjoy.

The Famous Brett Watson, famous at nutters org

There are a wide range of philosophical stances one can take on the free software issue. Rather than expound them here, I refer you to my (lengthy -- approx 70KB) essay on the matter. Interested parties can find it at the Nutters.org website, or a marginally out-of-date but slashdot-effect-proof mirror copy.

The Famous Brett Watson, famous@nutters.org