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"One good thing, though, is that I haven't seen Cisco's name on the list of companies that support this TCPA."

Maybe not that particular implementation, and possibly that could even change, but make no mistake..Cisco is right out there competing with the same basic idea. At least that's how it looks from this article.

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-5370427.html

From that article, and a few others like it I was able to google, it seems likely it's down to simply a decision on whos' implementation Cisco will end up using..their own, or someone else's.

There goes that "one good thing", I'm afraid to say..sorry. :-(

Strat

Maybe before they sue, but not necessarily before they threaten.

Maybe before they sue, but not necessarily before they threaten.

Maybe before they sue, but not necessarily before they threaten.

Apple to ditch IBM, switch to Intel chips

Maybe before they sue, but not necessarily before they threaten.

July 2004
http://searchenterpriselinux.techtarget.com/origin alContent/0,289142,sid39_gci992096,00.html

October 2004
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-3513_22-5409773.html?ta g=nl

Am I the only one who is tired of all this podcasting, bodcasting, roadcasting, godcasting, and rod casting?

There was a previous article about this with pictures.

You can find the pics here and here.

The story is here.

There was a previous article about this with pictures.

You can find the pics here and here.

The story is here.

Why/How can Firefox, which runs happily on W2K and others, offer better security, while IE cannot do the same on an OS developed by MS itself?

According to Microsoft, IE is integrated into the operating system itself -- it is no longer a standalone application. Ostensibly they did this to allow greater desktop-to-Internet integration, but given the inherent insecurity of ActiveX, the tendency for the forces of evil to use it maliciously, and the inability of users to lock it down, it's not exactly a hot selling point these days.

Firefox, on the other hand, stands to benefit immensely from all this. It offers a free, lightweight, standalone browser whose programming environment makes it easy for developers to extend its functionality without coopting its security (so far). It does this without any hooks into the operating system, and offers a variety of ways to combat malware, popups and generally obnoxious behavior (Flash movies, rampant advertising, etc).

Microsoft might claim that they won't be releasing any further security patches or functional upgrades to Windows 2000 or IE6. But as of September 2004, ~49% of Windows users still use Windows 2000 or lower (98, 95, NT, etc). Trying to scare users into upgrading their OS, so they can take advantage of a marginally improved, questionably more secure Windows, doesn't seem to be working anymore. And I'm by no means a Linux zealot -- I'm an ASP/SQL programmer, have been using Windows since v3.1, and am a huge fan of Microsoft's development tools / languages.

Besides landing my most recent job, discovering Firefox was the best tech-related thing that's come along in recent memory. It's inspired me to start learning more about client-side development again, after seeing what's possible with AJAX (Asynchronous Javascript And XML), standards-compliant CSS and XHTML. Once Dean Edwards' CSS-based IE7 stylesheet matures a bit more, developers will be able to instantly upgrade the set of standards-compliant available to IE 5/6 users. At that point, who will need IE 7? The days of developing wonderful new HTML and CSS tags that are only supported by one browser are in decline...... Firefox's market share has risen to just under 10% in the past year, while Microsoft's market share has dropped to under 90% for the first time since Netscape was still relevant. IE7 won't become ubiquitous for a long, long time, especially if Microsoft doesn't plan on making it available to users of its older operating systems. Why would developers of any web applications besides IE-only Intranets/Extranets create products that utilized features only available to a very small set of the installed user base?

So whatever, Microsoft. Dig your own grave, if you insist upon doing so. I'll continue to use your server-side tools, provided something better and easier-to-use doesn't come along, but at this point, you've lost me as a client-side developer of IE. Not that you should care, of course..... but if you can lose a devoted developer like me, I have to wonder how many others you've push away. It appears it's not all about "Developers, Developers, Developers!", as Steve Ballmer & Co. would have us believe.

E-mail from Microsoft's Charles Fitzgerald to MS execs on Novell/MS Java meeting

This is one of the documents recently unsealed in the legal case between Sun Microsystems Inc. and Microsoft Corp. over whether Microsoft behaved in an anti-competitive fashion in its handling of Java.

From: Charles Fitzgerald
Sent: Thursday, July 03, 1997 6:01 PM
To: Bill Gates; Paul Maritz; Jim Allchin; Bob Muglia
Cc: Russ Arun; David Cole; John Ludwig
Subject: Novell and Java

"[...] Needless to say, we asked why they were talking to us. They claim to be frustrated with the JavaSoft's lack of speed, resource limits and the "butthead factor" of their engineers. [...]"

Me too....

For those not in the know, Xen plus Intel's Vanderpool (or AMD's Pacifica) will allow you to get VMWare-like capabilities at near native speeds included into every Linux kernel.

http://www.answers.com/topic/xen
http://lists.xensource.com/archives/html/xen-devel /2005-02/msg00651.html
http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=1055

" As well, at a recent show Dave Nagel gave notice that Linux is PalmSource's platform for the future."

Looks like Mr. Nagel also gave notice of another kind.

Problem solved.. but you see this 'solution' has been discussed before about a year ago with COMCAST, then (probably still) the nets biggest spammer. Simply put it would cost them 58$ million in tech support costs.....

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-5218720.html

So, according to this article...

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-3513_22-5230615.html

Comcast is already supposedly doing this. I can't confirm that since I am going through the mail server anyway...

The spammers will figure out a way around it anyway.

Guys, I sympathize with all your complaints about tech jobs and not finding work. I also was a victim of downsizing and layoffs myslef in 2000. But I went back to school and have been working as a programmer for the last 4 years and seeing lots of work out there in this industry and opportunity for all. Its not like the boom years but there is work to be done. Most of the web stuff is getting so competitive that its not in demand but its out there. But .NET and high level web development is growing. Every business out there Ive met with is slowly moving everything online or into thin-client apps now.

Also, the push and pulls of IT supply and demand right now are confusing are diverse. From offshoring to more competition for IT services globally to more players to more trained IT people in India to less in the US, etc. etc. But when the smoke clears I cannot imagine with everything and everyone moving to digital, thatthere will npot be a HUGE demand for programmers and IT people in all forms to manage and build it. So, its a very good field and like someone says, supply and rising salaries will eventually drive more people back to the field.

Its obvious that so many of you are so bitter abotu your experienec with companies, and thats whats hurting the whole perspective.

I dont care how ignorant or dumb CIO's and project managers, CEO's, and senior business people are towards IT right now. It is and will eventually bite them in the rear when they realize they have to go back to the original model and pay and worship the US IT person as a legitimate and valued asset in their organization. That is slowly happening now, I believe. Despite the tools and offshoring replacing some of that, the field is expanding and diversifying so much that there is allot of work out there finally here in 2005....and more to come.

Read about unhappiness in outsourcing in India and new IT jobs in rural America growing:
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-5685170.html http://news.zdnet.com/2100-3513_22-5562732.html

Guys, I sympathize with all your complaints about tech jobs and not finding work. I also was a victim of downsizing and layoffs myslef in 2000. But I went back to school and have been working as a programmer for the last 4 years and seeing lots of work out there in this industry and opportunity for all. Its not like the boom years but there is work to be done. Most of the web stuff is getting so competitive that its not in demand but its out there. But .NET and high level web development is growing. Every business out there Ive met with is slowly moving everything online or into thin-client apps now.

Also, the push and pulls of IT supply and demand right now are confusing are diverse. From offshoring to more competition for IT services globally to more players to more trained IT people in India to less in the US, etc. etc. But when the smoke clears I cannot imagine with everything and everyone moving to digital, thatthere will npot be a HUGE demand for programmers and IT people in all forms to manage and build it. So, its a very good field and like someone says, supply and rising salaries will eventually drive more people back to the field.

Its obvious that so many of you are so bitter abotu your experienec with companies, and thats whats hurting the whole perspective.

I dont care how ignorant or dumb CIO's and project managers, CEO's, and senior business people are towards IT right now. It is and will eventually bite them in the rear when they realize they have to go back to the original model and pay and worship the US IT person as a legitimate and valued asset in their organization. That is slowly happening now, I believe. Despite the tools and offshoring replacing some of that, the field is expanding and diversifying so much that there is allot of work out there finally here in 2005....and more to come.

Read about unhappiness in outsourcing in India and new IT jobs in rural America growing:
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9595_22-5685170.html http://news.zdnet.com/2100-3513_22-5562732.html

Uniform Driver's License Standards vs. The Mark of the Beast

The Social Security card was never meant to be used for identification purposes. When the system was created in 1935, to assuage the concerns of American citizens, Congress insisted that the card would never and should never be used for purposes of identification. Its sole purpose was to ensure that workers were paying the required payroll tax. Individual workers were assigned numbers so that the proper governing authority could easily account for the contributions made to the Social Security fund. Nonetheless, the use of the number grew steadily over the years. Starting in 1961, the Civil Service Commission began using the number to identify all federal employees. In 1962, the IRS started requiring the number to appear on all completed tax returns.

This document explores the ways the SSN does not qualify as a violation of the warning of Revelation Chapter 13 concerning the mark of the beast. And why there is a new system coming soon that will come far too close. And given the drifting useage of the SSN, this new system is guaranteed, by design, to be in full violation of the warning, once the technology takes its logical course.

This new system of nationally uniform drivers license standards are standards written by the federal government that change licensing entirely. In fact it's a nice bit of newspeak to call it anything BUT a National ID card. It makes this turkey an easier sell. I, however, will call it what it is.

Since 9-11, many countries are working on National ID cards, including the United States. The plan is actually harder sell in liberal Europe than the US because Europe still has memories of how Nazi Germany used travel documentation in WWII as a means of control.

Tony Blair has opted for a voluntary cards. "However, it will be virtually impossible for anyone to live a normal life without the new ID card in England - possession of a valid card will be necessary for boarding an aircraft, buying gas, opening a bank account, starting a job or claiming government benefits." So much for "voluntary", unless you don't need to go anywhere. Like out of Germany in the late 1930's.

In the US, the voices against the National ID plan are almost exclusively pro-immigration groups. Seeing the majority of the population, including the church, relatively unsympathetic towards immigrants, and often downright hostile, is unfortunate. Especially considering the balance of the church's time is spent preaching, in a sense, what comes around, goes around. It reminds me of the poetic account of the rise of Nazi Germany.

When the Nazis came for the communists,
I did not speak out
because I was not a communist.

When they came for the social democrats,
I did not speak out
because I was not a social democrat.

When they came for the trade unionists
I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.

When they came for the Jews
I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew;

When they came for me,
there was no one left to speak out.
-Martin Niemöller (1892-1984)

To think that these IDs are someone else's problem is a falsehood in the first place. Such an ID card, if put into place, will be a gift to identity thieves, who will now be able to get all the information they need from multiple sources as seemingly innocuous as your video rental store. State DMVs have alrea

And you're clueless.

Years ago Microsoft has given the Chinese government access to the complete source code of Windows operating systems.
And the Chinese are not the only government who has access to the Windows source code.

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-3513_22-990526.html

"An economic review of the patent system", Machlup's study for the U.S. Congress in 1958, dug up this little gem from the UK (footnote 111 at p. 22):

"(...) vague or angry declarations that invention is property, and the lavish use of the expressions 'pirate' and 'pilfer', and 'stealing of the fruit of other men's minds and labour' [do not] prove more than that certain persons gain an advantage rightly or wrongly, which they wish to keep."

Rev. J.E.T. Rogers
On the Rationale and Working of the Patent Laws
Journal of the Statistical Society of London, vol. XXBI (1863), p. 128

Then how could the use of the words "Thought Thieves" and "stealing the ideas in your head" be anything else but an appalling attempt of indoctrination with blurred concepts of "IP"?
N.B. "mere" thoughts and ideas, neither expressed (copyright) nor reduced to practice (patents)...

I do not agree that copyright or patents are immoral per se, it is rather a problem of what e.g. the DMCA and the EU Directives on copyright and patents (try to) make of them...

This is a surprise to anyone?
Just a couple of years back, you know... shortly before "Microsoft's assimilation of RAV Antivirus", when asked why it took Microsoft 25 years to start taking security seriously, Microsoft CTO Craig Mundie was quoted as saying "Because customers wouldn't pay for it until recently."

Come on... this is Microsoft we're talking about here. Color me cynical if you want, but they've never done anything more than lip service with regards to anything other than their own bottom line.

A good example is the article here. "One hearing disclosed police invoked the Patriot Act 108 times in a 22-month period" would be a much more useful piece of information if we got a chance to see whether the cases in question did, in fact, involve terrorism.

Actually, the quote is misleading and irrelevant. Sec. 213 "Authority for delaying notice of the execution of a warrant" does not expire. Ever. I've posted this before, but I think it bears repeating...

The US government has been trying to slip this one by us since well before 9/11. It was shot down at least three times in recent history. First it was the Cyberspace Electronic Security Act (CESA). Then the Clinton administration tried to push it through with a meth bill. When that failed, they tried to sneak in through as an amendment to a bankruptcy bill. All the while, the DOJ, led by Reno, was claiming to already have this power without any need for additional legislation in the Nicodemo Scarfo case.

Well, with the PATRIOT ACT, they finally got it. Your only hope now is to have it shot down in the Supreme Court. Both parties have been pushing for this for some time. The People had already spoken. We consistently and emphatically told them 'hell no'. It's clear that Congress has stopped representing the people.

Keep in mind where MS is located. The west coast is more liberal than many other places. Had they been located in San Francisco rather than near Seattle, I'm sure they would have changed their practices even earlier. But how do you reconcile them changing their stance on the poilitical front twice in one month? Especially considering the following: "I respect that there will be different viewpoints. But as CEO, I am doing what I believe is right for our company as a whole." and "Even when people disagree with something that we do, they need to have confidence that we based our action on thoughtful principles, because that is how we run our business." Both statements by Ballmer, quoted here. Perhaps I would have some respect for them had they sat down and made a decision one way or the other, and stuck with it for any real period of time. As it is, they're just waffling.

Professor Richard Hamming was fond of saying that you can get money beyond your dreams if you solve any one of the 3 hardest problems in physics - timetravel, antigravity, or teleportation. Do you see Physics majors attacking these problems tooth & nail ? As Hammings explains, there's just no known attack.

Americans aren't warming up to the sciences simply because they have a choice. Students get to decide what they want to study. They look at the difficulty levels of the subject, the job market, ask their peers & parents, look at career prospects & evaluate their "sexiness", and decide to major in English & Communication & Marketing instead. In India, where I come from, you simply didn't have a choice, (well, not until you were 18 anyway, by which time it was too late for most of us). You were asked to digest megadoses of math & science in high school. Hell, I remember working on some "preliminary math" problems when I did my Masters in CompSci in the US. The problems were ones I had previously encountered when I was in my early teens, in my high school! But the Professor said American undergrads needed that sort of thing!!

You guys have a choice, so you study literature & photography & journalism & whatnot in your high school. In India, the only choices are math, more math & much more math. So I can comfortably handle a second order differential equation. But to this day I have not studied Shakespear ( spelling ? ), Rosseu, Homer ( not simpson, the pgilosopher chap), Keats, Byron or any other literary figures. I just know the names cause we crammed them for various "general knowledge" quizzes!

Education systems are broken all over the world. In places like India & China, we get a one-sided hard-core math-sci curricula with no literature. In the US/UK, you guys get liberal arts with less math/science than what Bill Gates wants to hire.

Prizes are not the answer (Nor is a $100 laptpop for developing nations). I don't know what is.

For all those talking about what kind of OS Cell will run:
ZDNet Article on Cell

The article is dated in some ways (like when it says 16 cores...I believe it is half that right?) but it does point out some interesting things, for example, like the fact that there will be a Cell SDK and a end-user OS aimed at embedded devices and the like.

If you google around for 'cell forums' you will come across interesting discussions where they point out that linux will be ported very quickly to cell and that IBM has hinted at possible uses for Cell as a workstation. Also, Cell is OS NEUTRAL meaning that it does not have any particular hardware functionality that makes one OS run any faster.

Overall, I would say that since market penetration is needed, you can't just say "Here is our OS and our SDK, use it from now on". The trick will be of course, to assuage the existing target audience who use today's OS's.

Also, note that the Cell is not a processor bred entirely for the PS3 or anything like that - it will be embedded in devices such as PVR's, TV's, music players, and in all likelyhood, it will even find its way to the desktop - with its potential it is likely to also find some niche in supercomputing since it will be cheap (if 4 whole cells can be thrown into a game console why not?)

I had to repost this, why has the patent office done a 180 on patent system reform? Now we can expect it by Christmas, I don't think this present is going to help the elves.

Folks this proposed change has nothing to do with "fixing" the patent system, this would be a whole sale intelectual property land grab.

"The head of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has endorsed some key reforms that Congress is scheduled to consider this year."

"Patent Office chief Jon Dudas said Monday that federal law should be changed to award a patent to the first person to file a claim and to permit review of a patent after it is granted. Currently patents are awarded to the first person who concocted the invention, a timeframe that can be difficult to prove."

I love how the "rightfull inventor" has been recast to "first person who concocted the invention", so much for patents being about "protecting inventors", now it seems it will be about protecting "Software Publishers".

No more pesky prior art to slow down the corporate patent factories. It's now going to be about how fast can you file.

These folks won't be satisfied untill independent coders are as bottled up and stripped clean as artists in the music industry. Watch, with MS enthusiasticly onboard patent reform, this will be a pretext to further tilt the process toward large entities, all the while claiming this *is* the much needed reform everyone has been calling for.

"Monday's hearing before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee kicked off a process that's expected to end in new legislation being drafted by the end of the year."

And it's gonna be another bullet-train

"Other legislative possibilities include lengthening the duration of a patent, currently 20 years. "I've begun to wonder whether the time for the patent is an adequate time," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif."

Yea, it *can* get worse.

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9588_22-5683954.html

Well, I am still waiting to see when they can "secure their perimeter". When they either start providing their internet services on naked boxes, or run their own OS for their firewalls and security is when I will believe they have decided to try to be serious about security. Until then it's all just marketing.

Then again, they have demonstrated a supreme lack of understanding when it comes to security so who knows.

Actually, I think we're seeing the maturation of a "corral the wagons" paranoia in Microsoft's culture. Lacking the ability to push any serious innovation internally (let's be serious, most of Microsoft's innovations during the past 20 years were brought in through acquisitions or copycat development ala VMS for NT, liberal borrowing from OS/2, Apple and Mach, etc). Now that antitrust severely limits acquisition growth, Microsoft is facing the same threat that broke Worldcom. Unable to make significant acquisitions, unable to meet growth internally, and now unable to cook the books like Worldcom, Microsoft's certain to get very defensive as the pressures heat up.

I thought I saw the beginnings of this phenomenon in 1998 at the IPv6 summit, where Microsoft's techs at the conference were explaining their implementation at first with great pride, only to be somewhat ashamed at how much they hadn't followed the specification very well, had numerous bugs and compatibility issues, and were clearly well behind everyone else. Nearly every other operating system had a much more mature implementation. (How long did that IPv6 stack remain a beta too?)

Amazingly, Microsoft is now attempting to patent IPv6 through a copy-cat specification (as was discussed on slashdot). Somehow it's not amusing when the kid who was not very successful in his participation in the group assignment decides to take exclusive credit for the group's effort.

So now Microsoft is blaming IPv4's engineering (when just like IPv6, everyone else seemed to understand and master the assignment EXCEPT Microsoft)?

As a teacher of mine once said to perpetual underachievers in class: Perhaps you might consider a career in food service instead?

An interesting article on ZDNet on Documentation is good, but source code is better

Good documentation practice from Linux.com.

The original posting actually read:

Apparently, Microsoft feels there aren't enough security holes in Windows, so they're planning to add a new one big enough to float Paul Allen's yacht through. According to ZDNet, Microsoft plans to add
the software equivalent of a 'black box' flight recorder to Windows. According to the article, "The tool will build on the existing Watson error-reporting tool in Windows but will provide Microsoft with much deeper information, including what programs were running at the time of the error and even the contents of documents that were being created." The spyware writers are now licking their lips in anticipation: "Let's see, I couldn't get into that encrypted IM system before, but now all I have to do is crash the system at the right time and then I can grab that whole chat session. Like, that's clutch!"

The original posting actually read:

Apparently, Microsoft feels there aren't enough security holes in Windows, so they're planning to add a new one big enough to float Paul Allen's yacht through. According to ZDNet, Microsoft plans to add
the software equivalent of a 'black box' flight recorder to Windows. According to the article, "The tool will build on the existing Watson error-reporting tool in Windows but will provide Microsoft with much deeper information, including what programs were running at the time of the error and even the contents of documents that were being created." The spyware writers are now licking their lips in anticipation: "Let's see, I couldn't get into that encrypted IM system before, but now all I have to do is crash the system at the right time and then I can grab that whole chat session. Like, that's clutch!"

... the most data-intensive physics instrument on the planet. Today eight major computing centers successfully completed a challenge to sustain a continuous data flow of 600 megabytes per second ...

By the way, concerning this Yahoo! trial about nazi stuff, former Yahoo! CEO has been cleared of charges a few weeks ago. I submitted the story, but maybe my writing was shitty, or maybe the /. editors had a lot of slashvertisement to post that day.

One key difference is that Nikon has not only left their file format undocumented, they've actively encrypted a key image parameter, allegedly as a spoiler tactic to prevent 3rd party developers fully parsing the files without signing up as 'approved' developers. If Nikon decides you are a 'bona fide' software company worthy of the honour, you can get hold of an SDK (apparently Windows/Mac C++ only with binary runtime libraries) but won't be given a full description of the file format. This has serious implications for the use of Nikon NEF files as an archival format (will Nikon's SDK components work on whatever OS you are running in 20 years time?), for developers who want to use their own algorithms (like Adobe), and for FOSS projects. Luckily, Dave Coffin has already reverse engineered the decryption algorithm in the current version of his open source dcraw RAW converter, so we're not yet locked out of the NEF format. What isn't yet clear is whether Nikon will continue with this sort of tactic in future NEF versions, and if Adobe will overcome their DMCA concerns to fully support NEF in their ACR raw converter (assuming they're not just grandstanding). Incidentally, there's a brief description by Tom Christiansen of the white balance encryption algorithm here, and a pointer by Thomas Knoll (of Photoshop fame) to the relevant section of the dcraw code here.

'nuff respect to all junglists: KPMG song - jungle mix

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1040_22-5518574.html

Well maybe it was HD-DVD they wanted due to the lower cost....anyway that article talks about the issue.

How does that differ from RMS, who could be summarized like "GPL rulez! All other licenses suck!"

That's oversimplified? Yes, that's even more simplified than your "summary" of Schwartz speach. Maybe you should read the article inside the slashdot story.

Multiple vulnerabilities that could allow an attacker to install malicious code or steal personal data have been discovered in the Mozilla Suite and the Firefox open-source browser. Details of the nine flaws were published on Mozilla's security Web site over the weekend.

oh boy

How does Google know it's "video"? Can't I just pipe my own CDs into the audio tracks of a blank MPG2/4 file? Then I can listen to my own music anywhere, over those famously fat Google pipes. This is fair use of content that I legitimately own, even according to the entertainment industry before the Supreme Court. By extension, can't I rename any file "..mp4", and use Google to distribute it? They're not going to watch all these movies, are they?

Something tells me the students are reacting to this recent story about a Columbia University professor grading papers by computer Those crazy kids.

Using the same stats, one could claim that MS could lose as much as 10% of its mid-sized business customers over the next three years.

It's all in how the editors choose to spin the story.

Agreed. Read this to see what happens when ideology clashes with wanting the best tool for the job.

I understand where RMS is coming from - as the leader of the Free Software Foundation he needs to be squeaky clean as possible in espousing his ethics in order to be as effective as possible. I also know that as it is with most anything, Freedom is a dual edged sword, and cuts both ways. Freedom gained for some usually means Freedom lost for others.

If I could solve that dillema, I sure wouldn't be posting here, now. As it is my head hurts, and I need a drink. I'll let philosophers and kings work out the solution.

Soko

You can't see the headlights bearing down on you eh?

Look at this

The juicy bit :

"McCain envisions erecting physical checkpoints, dubbed "screening points," near subways, airports, bus stations, train stations, federal buildings, telephone companies, Internet hubs and any other "critical infrastructure" facility deemed vulnerable to terrorist attacks. Secretary Tom Ridge would appear to be authorized to issue new federal IDs--with biometric identifiers--that Americans could be required to show at checkpoints. "

No they can't, according to this article:

...if they actually win this case they ll be barred from challenging ripping in the future under the doctrine of judicial estoppel.

This is a very important point. They cannot have it both ways--whether they like it or not. They have let the proverbial cat out of the bag.

In my years of reading slashdot, this is one of the most horribly worded article submissions.

Does slashdot editors consider music sharing in the same light as phishing/spamming and the magic love pill? The teenager seems to be mentioned on the same lines of the other youngsters who were targetted by the RIAA.

In related news, which company makes the most focused effort to bringing the spam-pigs to justice? Check Here

I can see only one reason for all this. Its Microsoft!

Ever heard of the concept "one click and you're guilty?" Users of this feature who unknowingly perform a search that returns results containting offensive/illegal content may find themselves being prosecuted by local, state or Federal authorities...

Proof of concept: Google caught in anti-Semitism flap. Replace "anti-semitism" with "child pornography" and you'll understand what I'm getting at...

It is pretty much unargued something is spam when it is for commercial purposes, the headers provide misleading information such as inaccurate/mispelled Subject: and/or From: fields, and while you've tried to find one the sender doesn't provide a working and effective means to say "Stop Bugging Me!!!"

There's arguement as to whether political or religious messages can be Spam; and whether it is automatically Spam if you haven't asked for it, or only becomes Spam once you try to tell the sender to stop. For political/religious messages, the US 1st Amendment gives such senders more protection here, and the rates of response versus revulsion will probably limit the use for such (as Dean demonstrated by mistake). For the latter, I'd say such situations are why the law can make distinctions between civil offenses, misdemeanors, and felonies when defining something as a crime.

I think it would do wonders for our country if misspellings in commercial messages were made a crime. =)

Now I hate Java just as much as the next guy, (well probably moreso, but anyhow...) but I've compiled and used OpenOffice 1.x many times, and let me tell you--Java is not the problem. OpenOffice is *already* enormous and bloated and slow. It also already requires Java just to build the darn thing, or at least it did when I built it. Whether it depends more or less on Java, I don't care as long as it gets at least two of smaller, less bloated, faster...

So, ok, now that we're agreed that we aren't necessarily talking about a technical issue here. Again, what's the problem. That "Java isn't open source"? Well why don't you ask IBM to open up a JVM for you. Or, better yet, write your own! Java is widely used, readily available, and actually pretty darn open as these things go.

So what's the problem. Ideology? Zealotry? Arcane license disputes? Well, it's nothing that'll get in the way of me and my word processor. Just wake me up if it gets larger, more bloated, slower... :)

Am I the only one who remembers this headline a few months ago.

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-3513_22-5108018.html