Slashdot Mirror
Censorship != Innovation
Every time I see Bill Gates or Steve Ballmer on television, spouting the Microsoft party line about the 'freedom to innovate,' I can't help but think of Inigo Montoya in the movie the Princess Bride, saying "You keep using that word... I do not think it means what you think it means." It would be extremely easy to write an article on how most of Microsoft's innovation in the software industry is actually based on licensing issues and business models instead of technology. I won't be doing that this time.
My name is Emmett Plant. I write full-time for a website called Slashdot. I post news bits to the page throughout the day, and I also write features about interesting stuff. I tend not to editorialize, and I choose to show my bias in the stories I choose to write rather than to show bias in the reporting of news. An interesting thing about Slashdot is that we've got a system where people can comment on stories that we post or write. The most important thing about this system is that anyone can post a comment, either as a logged-in user, or as a user we call 'Anonymous Coward.' Based on how interesting the comments are, they get moderated to thresholds in the systems by logged-in users on a number scale system. So, while some really intelligent comment may go to a higher threshold, and a stupid comment may go to a lower threshold, the most important thing is that none of the comments ever get erased. If you're interested in reading everything that's been posted about a story, you can do so. The very basic idea is that if we don't impede on freedom of speech, a greater number of varying viewpoints can be expressed.
The system isn't perfect. We get trolls and miscreants tearing through the comments with comments about nude teenage movie stars, breakfast foods, and the scientific process of petrification. Based on the story, time of day, phase of the moon and the cost of tea in China, the signal-to-noise ratio in the comments fluctuates wildly. Still, we've created a system where intelligent people can say intelligent things in a free forum that tends to bring the cream to the top of the chaos.
Slashdot is viewed in the media as the place where the Open Source and Free Software communities meet and voice their opinions. This may be true, it may not. Nevertheless, we get a staggering amount of pageviews every day, and we're read by people all over the world at all hours of the day. Everyone who works on Slashdot is an Open Source enthusiast, so that bias is shown in the news we post and write everyday, but it doesn't stop there. If you go to a Star Trek convention, you'll find that most of the people there are Star Trek fans, but are also fans of The X-Files, Japanese animation, and computers in general. In the same vein, Slashdot readers are also interested in cutting-edge technology, digital content delivery, and the preservation of constitutional rights. In other words, we've got a lot to talk about, and we talk about it twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Some of our readers also meet online in IRC channels devoted to talking about Slashdot content on a number of different IRC networks.
Linux users are painted as the 'enemy' of Microsoft, although that's not necessarily the case. In my own experience, Linux users value freedom over bandwidth. For many people, Linux is an alternative to Microsoft's products not because of any vast performance difference, but because using Linux enables them to work in a world where their common system environment isn't controlled by a proprietary interest. While many Linux users take a vitriolic stance on Microsoft's monopolistic machinations in the industry, the argument really isn't a Microsoft vs. Linux issue. It's an issue of being able to choose a free and available development and operating platform over a closed-source, proprietary platform, and that means that Microsoft isn't the enemy. The biggest problem that Free Software enthusiasts need to overcome is the ideology and the processes behind the proprietary business model. Despite motions in the direction of the Open Source model, Sun Microsystems and Apple Computer are just as guilty as Microsoft in establishing a closed proprietary environment. Microsoft is just the most widespread 800-pound gorilla.
The problem with the proprietary software model is that it puts users and applications at odds with the interest that controls the common system environment, whether that platform is MacOS, Solaris, or Windows. This means that it will always be in the owner's best interest not to share it's best knowledge and research with the people writing software for the platform; Why should we let someone else make the money? We can do it ourselves. This is why Microsoft's 'Freedom to Innovate' campaign is hypocrisy at best, and the source of endless amusement in the Free Software community. Microsoft's finest innovations to date have been in their ruthless business dealings and monopolistic tendencies. Freedom to Innovate more money into their coffers, that is. The word 'innovation' used to have a pleasant, exciting connotation. It meant people were building things to make life better on this planet. Electricity. Running water. Solar-powered cars. Nanotechnology. Bulletin board systems that gave equal and free opportunity to everyone who wants to post, and a threshold system to bring the best posts to the top. You know, innovation. When smart people do smart things so everyone can benefit. That's 'innovation' in my book.
Yesterday, Andover.Net Editor-in-Chief Robin Miller posted a news bit to the front of Slashdot titled 'Microsoft Asks Slashdot To Remove Reader Comments.' Sit back and look at that title again. It makes Free Software champions and Open Source enthuasiasts see red, and it made this Slashdot Author seethe with intense anger. We offer an opportunity to give everyone in the world a chance to speak, and Microsoft wants us to pull reader comments off of our site, after Linux users and Open Source enthusiasts have been talking trash about Microsoft in our reader comments for that past two-and-a-half years. You bet. Microsoft is hoping to use a statement in the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (which is now law) to stab back at Slashdot for a small number of postings about their Kerberos specification. You've got to be kidding me. Robin received the E-mail from the Microsoft attorney, and it was posted in its entirety, as well as Robin's response letter to Microsoft. When I left the the house yesterday morning, the story appeared to being well on its way to becoming the most popular Slashdot story of all time.
Where will we go from here? We'll wait. We've issued a letter back to Microsoft, and we're looking for ideas on how to deal with this in the best way possible. We're talking to lawyers, software gurus, business people, and Slashdot comment posters. We're talking to everyone. Please let us know what you think we should do.
People come to Slashdot and post on Slashdot because they know that Slashdot's comment system is the epitomy of the 'equal time' concept. They know we're Open Source zealots, and that we will never, ever back down. We're too smart for that. I'm hoping that Andover.Net takes this to court. Jeff 'Hemos' Bates told me that I would be flown to wherever the court case would take place. If I'm given the chance, I'll be on the stand, defending the rights of every Slashdot reader comment that has ever been moderated down, moderated up, stayed on topic, asked that I be fired, talked about my wife, or posted whatever was in their head at the time. It's a principle thing. Congress shall make no law.
Emmett, thanks for your detailed post. Personally, I agree that M$ can go stew in their own juices. They have no one but themselves to blame for taking an open standard (Kerberos) and trying to turn it into another of their Pet Proprietary Protocols.
;-)
Hey! There it is! A new definition for PPP!
Emmett wrote:
:)
They know we're Open Source zealots, and that we will never, ever back
down. We're too smart for that.
That's all I wanted to hear. You guys kick ass.
-Waldo
Yes - finally, a slashdot article with good _content_, not hype! Jon Katz could really use some lessons from this guy. . . and Emmet, write more editorials. And give your self a nice karma bonus, this is actually good stuff.
-- Imagine how much more advanced our technology would be if we had eight fingers per hand.
I thought feature was rather unimpressive, and missing the point. Since it's aimed primarily at non-regular Slashdot readers, the title is likely to be incomprehensible to non-geeks. How many people know what != means?
As for the feature, it does not address Microsoft's claims of copyright infringement in any detail, but is rather a generic argument for the Open Source credo of free speech & beer. I don't think this approach is particularly effective in this context; new visitors to this site (I would imagine) are more likely to be interested in why slashdot (if it chooses to fight in court) thinks Microsoft's claims are unfounded. (I also thought the exposition of Open Source principles of freedom was a bit weak, but that's another thread...)
Given the law (DMCA) as it stands, it's more of a copyright issue than free speech. One might argue that the DMCA is wrong, immoral or unconstitutional, but it is on the basis of the DMCA that the court case will be fought, not high-minded priciples of free speech, unless you want to argue that the DMCA violates the First Amendment. In that case, the article should have made that point.
---
Felix qui potest rerum cognoscere causas
And keep up the good work
Very nicely written! Emmet makes some wonderful, thought out, and well expressed points. You should write editorials more often, because, it appears you have a knack for them.
While this is a big Open Source issue, its also a big issue for everyone that isn't running M$'s OS. I'm a mac user and I realize that the closing and hiding of such protocols can totally prevent cross platform communication.
One of my favorite sayings: You can kick a dog til he does one of two things, 1) roll over and die, or 2) get up and take your leg off. M$ has been kicking a lot of smaller, all but helpless dogs, but I think this time that they've made a mistake and kicked one of the baddest pit bulls ever.....heck why stop at the leg.
Gig'em
I dunno, Emmett, I think this is a hard call. The reason I think it's a hard call is that I really think Microsoft has a legitimate claim that if they copyright something, and somehow it's on your site in violation of that copyright, somebody has to be responsible to take it down. I mean, if somebody were to post on /. the text to a copyrighted screenplay, for example, then wouldn't it seem reasonable for them to ask you to take it off of your servers? The whole point of copyright law is that information is _not_ open source, no matter how much you may want it to be, unless the person who came up with the information explicitly makes it available. That said, I think you have the weight of US copyright law against you, and I don't think anything is going to change that law. Information will just never be by nature free and open because part of our market is that if you come up with an idea, you shouldn't have that idea stolen from you and made profitable by somebody else. And something else. The Open Source community doesn't do what they do because they have the weight of law behind them. Open Soruce is a choice, not anything worked into our economy. I like the car analogy that I read a while back, that people choose Open Source not because it's better but because they want to have the option of having ANYbody with skills service what they've bought. Car makers don't keep as a secret the inner workings of their cars, so we have the freedom to take our car wherever we want to get it serviced. If a car maker came along who welded the hood shut and said only they can service your car, then nobody would buy it because it's a bad deal. Even if the car were much better than others available, the option of having your car serviced ANYwhere jumps the worth of the car to more than make up for the difference in quality. So don't try to get the force of law behind you, guys. You're simlpy cannot force Microsoft to play by Open Source rules just as much as Microsoft cannot force us to play by proprietary rules. Our market is set up so that people who want to make something proprietary CAN and can keep it that way with the force of law. The idea of open sourcing is simply another (albeit in our opinions better) marketing model. It has no force of law in its favor. So if we're going to beat Microsoft, we're going to have to do it on their terms. We're going to have to let them keep their proprietariness and STILL manage to beat them. Which we will. But don't try and bend the law in your favor in the dispute. By posting Kerberos to the web, their code lost its trade secret status, but it's still copyrightable and its still theirs. I welcome anybody more informed than I to fix any misconceptions on copyright law I may have, but those were my $.02
a gladiator match in the Coliseum between the editors of Slashdot and Caesar Gates. ;^)
Bravo, an excellent statement emmett!
Another thought--what's the worst that will happen to Gates and Ballmer if the DOJ comes down as hard as they can on Microsoft? Will they go bankrupt? Will they go to jail? Or will they still have more money than they can possibly spend? They've got nothing to fear.
numb
nothing like cutting right through the shit. there is not much i can say to top what you just did. however, Emmett Plant, you are not the only one willing to hop on a plane to support this cause. please keep us informed (i'm sure you will)
If the world was sensible, I'd look forward to having this tried in court - many of the requests to remove material are so obviously preposterous that Micros~1 ought to be laughed out of court. With the DeCSS / CyberPatrol / MP3.com idiocy going on, I'm not so sure any more.
"You can bypass the click-though licence agreement on Microsoft's PAC specification by opening the file with WinZip instead of running the file". There. Have you violated the DMCA today?
"The good die first." "Most of us are morally ambiguous, which explains our random dying patterns." --- MST3K
I'm just as against censorship as the next guy around here, but I think some of what Microsoft said was valid. Overall, censorship is not good, but neither is unauthorized use of someone else's property. I've got news for you: copying != innovation, either.
It seems that the majority of what Microsoft complained about was the unauthorized reproduction of their materials. Quite frankly, this is illegal. It might not make much sense, since the materials are readily available to the public, but Microsoft does have the right to restrict access to them.
This probably isn't a particularly popular view. However, I think the best way to avoid this type of thing is for Slashdot to set up their own limits on their own terms before someone else forces them to. Perhaps if Slashdot allows moderators to report comments containing illegal material and appoints someone to remove such material, we could avoid future conflicts.
Slashdot should not be held responsible for users' comments. There is nothing wrong with posting an opinion that may upset people. However, I think Slashdot does have a responsibility to limit illegal abuse of the system, just as web hosting services cannot permit illegal content or spamming from their servers. Simply put, if Slashdot couldn't post it themselves, they should prevent users from posting it.
Unfortunately, it's bound to happen eventually. Freedom on the internet is dying quickly. It has reached the point that a company can be hired to find out who you are given an internet alias. If Slashdot doesn't regulate its users more, someone else will, and it won't be pretty.
It's just a suggestion, and I don't like it any more than you do...
"I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy." -Richard Feynman
First of all let me state that as of about two years ago I wasn't much of an open source advocate. I used computers and bought software but I didn't think of the alternatives that were available to me. One random conversation changed that when a friend of mine suggested that I visit Slashdot. From that day on I became much more involved in the world around me as it pertained to open source and free speech.
I began by acquiring a copy of Slackware to try. And from there on my OS of choice has been Linux. Unfortunately I have to use Win9x/NT at work because the software that is essential to my profession is only win based (AutoCAD R14). But I have been trying to change that. I have been in touch with an AutoDesk employee, hoping to convince them to port Acad to Linux. I have also been in touch with publications in my field advocating Linux based Acad variants.
But I digress. I wanted to give my thanks to the posters, editors, writers and the rest of the Slashdot society. If it hadn't been for this site my eyes may have been in blinders to this day. Slashdot had been a beacon in my life as well as in others I'm sure.
I applaud you.
And I thank you, for a place for those of us to learn as well as educate.
flatrabbit,
peripheral visionary
"Never wrestle with a pig, you both get dirty and the pig likes it."
I think that this editorial does a smooth job of a New To Slashdot FAQ, times being what they are.
Be prepared, however, to be quoted in the media as representative of the entire community (which you should know is a no-win situation). There are generally n+1 opinions on a given subject on Slashdot, where n is an arbirarily large number.
Personally, I would have liked to see more ruminations on the legal situation. Certainly the Andover people have met with a lawyer and have a little insight into their position.
Personally, I think the solution is simple. Fair use applies to copyrighted works, so make the publication of the code fit into fair use specifications, ie. for research or criticism. Give an equal fraction of the code to posters and have them repost the code with their comments attached. Then no single person has reposted the entire source and each individual portion is fair use. Leave it as an exercise for the reader to concatenate the posts; a trivial task but one that should easily evade any copyright issues.
Then have someone deal with the "trade secret" issue and someone with the "licensed text" issue.
This problem is easily one for the OS crowd: with many eyes, all legal technicalities become trivial.
I don't need large brains to have a good time.
Well.. Emmett, that was certainly a good post. It was good reading, whether it was an intelligent article, I am not very sure. You see, I have been on both sides of the battle since it started and to be truthful I havent seen anyone losing..yet. And to be frank, I dont see any clear winner too. Well all are aware that Microsoft and other major corporations have no regard for the freedom that a User might want in choosing different solutions. And I am pretty sure, that Microsoft Software is one of the buggiest, but at the same time, thats not a rarity. I have seen Open source being buggy too.. but thats not the point. This world have two kinds of people, those who use computers for a living, and those who use computers as a way to enhance their living. 90% falls on the latter side. Now, these are not people who are zombies as Geeks portray them to be, they are just ordinary people who have been living out their lives, content with what they have and wouldnt use a computer unless theres a reason for it. They dont give a damn whether they are using Linux or Windows or Solaris, all they expect is results. 90% of the Worlds Business also follow suit. They dont care if its Microsoft Solutions they use or Open Source. If they get a good support for those solutions that they implement and then theres the critical "time to market" issue..and at the end of the day, if the Business is done, then they are all happy. However, not everyone is happy , especiall the Open Source enthusiasts. Now I admit that 60% of them are true intellects people who wont take a beating lying down. We are people who have seen and built better software than the ones forced upon them. And we dont take it lying back. So we stand up and yell for all the worlds attention. We tell them that these companies are milking us and we should start looking at better solutions which are necessarily free. But, does anything happen..I dont think so. Now all this analogy between Open Source and Rebels in the Star wars is quite amicable, but then again, people dont give a damn. You see, if Person "A" gets his job done, gets what he want, at the end of the day he is happy. He doesnt mind, if Windows crashes twice during the day. He wouldnt give a damn if Microsoft charges him more, as long as he is getting what he wants. But to think that he would use a complex solution as Linux or any other open source solutions, clearly better than the one he is using now, wont cut a niche with him. Microsoft is clearly guilty of taking the Kerberos spec and then changing it to their own needs. But did the people who developed the Spec, ever say that the Extensions had to be public or open ? They didnt, so they should learn to shut up instead. I am not saying that Microsoft is right in doing so, but lawfully, if what they did is right, then everyone else should shut up and let them be. They have enough problems in their hands to worry about now. Windows2000 may have 64,000 bugs, but for me, it hasnt crashed once in the last seven months I have been using it. I run Linux and Apache too (www.hackorama.com). But then again,we really dont give a damn whether Windows2000 is better than NT, do we ? We have Linux, so everyone else should be using Linux. Well.. I dont think thats gonna happen. Linux is powerful in its own realms. But, you cant forget the fact that these major corpns would come up with better solutions sometimes. Now, MS is right once in asking Slashdot to remove postings which include part of their Extensions to the Kerberos spec. After all its a copyright violation, no matter how you look at it. \. is responsible for the postings here. And if a wrong is done, then they are morally responsible to make it right. Well, I am sure that a lot of comments might pop up as a reply to my post. But thats what I like about Slashdot. This is one Discussion Group that I would never wanna leave, because I still believe that the people here are capable of more than flaming microsoft. Maybe we should just let them be and learn to move on. Theres so much more to computing than Microsoft.
Rapid Nirvana
Also btw, is slashdot gonna gun for the DMCA? Maybe enlist the ACLU and try to have DMCA revoked as law?
Let me know what you think in the comments.
Well, here's what I think. I think you guys had better start listening to your lawyers instead of Jon Katz and his teenage fan club. Both you and Roblimo have basically stated the position you plan to take, with no apparent knowledge of what the law actually is. You're going to paint yourselves into a situation where you'll have to choose between your site's future and its credibility.
It's ironic -- the old Slashdot is being slowly strangled by the site's new identity as the center of a poorly thought-out, inconsistent ideology for socially inept, teenage Napster users who think they're heroes because they insist on their right to download porn in the library and to never have to pay for software or music. It would be funny if that mentality ended up killing Slashdot financially at the same time.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Ok, first of all, we have Microsoft which takes an open source specification, modifies it in a few near-trivial ways, then claims it's their own copyrighted work. This is pretty classic "Microsoft innovation" for you, but let's put the fact that Microsoft doesn't actually own Kerberos aside.
/. server?). So overall, MS's letter is grossly innacurate.
/that/ argument before?). That has some unpleasant conotations under the burdensome DMCA, but it's still worth looking into.
;).
I don't know if Slashdot has already modified the story in question, but when *I* look back over the story at the articles MS claims contain actual copies of the specification, all I find is links to the specification. Also, it seems that all the timestamps in MS's letter are off by an hour (although this could just be a result of some crazy database porting to the new
There's about a dozen differnt ways slashdot can fight this.
A link to a site should never be illegal. Microsoft doesn't own links (although maybe they'll copyright the 'A HREF="" COLOR=""' tag when they're done butchering kerberos, they have to be free to innovate after all). If Microsoft has problems with the content of a page, then they should go to that page to solve their problems, not pages which link to it. This is common sense, although I don't know if the law in the US upholds common sense anymore, so we'll have to see.
It's arguable that Slashdot is only acting as a conduit for information. An ISP if you will. (Hey, wait a minute, where have I heard
Under fair use, copyrighted materials can be reproduced for commentary in an educational or journalistic environment, which Slashdot quallifies as IMHO (the latter, at any rate).
I'm at work right now, so I'm gonna cut this off and get to my point; I originally thought that slashdot should remove portions of the document actually posted to the discussion groups, and leave the links etc... but the more I think about it, the more I realize how wrong this would be. I don't think the messages should be modified at all.
If we're forced to change them, I think we should replace offending content with "***CENSORED BY MICROSOFT***" to express our disconent (I'd suggest a boycott, but I hardly think that'd be effective amongst slashdot readers, since I doubt many of us use MS's software except under extreme duress
We should try and spread the story as far as we can see; write letters to local + national papers, Senators, members of Congress, the DoJ, everywhere. The world should be shown that even as Microsoft is presenting a benign image to the court, saying "We'll be good. Please don't break us up", they're doing exactly the same thing that they're in court for!
I hope Judge Jackson breaks them up with a large jackhammer...
I caught this story this morning on the radio, here's a link to AP's version. The gist is that Ford passed out a 98-page book at it's annual shareholders meeting that, according to AP, "says sport utility vehicles are environmentally unfriendly, chug gas and can be a danger to drivers in smaller vehicles. The automaker also said its high-profit business in SUVs doesn't always jibe with its desire to be more environmentally responsible." They go on to say that they will continue to build SUVs, using that old corporate truism "[if Ford] limited its SUV sales in the name of environmental concerns, competitors would simply pick up more customers." However you may feel about Ford, SUVs and quality of life issues in general, I have to say that I'm a lot less annoyed by Ford's statements than by M$'s claims of "innovation."
/flybait /., you boys appear to have pissed someone off]
[only 4hrs to get through to
-- we'll eat the fat ones first
In that respect /. has nothing to worry about and what M$ should really be trying to do is subpoena the personal information of the posters' in question. But we all know /. would never give that up. :-)
-ryan
"Any way you look at it, all the information that a person accumulates in a lifetime is just a drop in the bucket."
Well-thought summary of this thing that is Slashdot. Very inspirational. Hype that I can believe in.
Way to represent.
The kerberos garbage here is simple:
a) MS modifies <i>BSD licensed</i> program for their own proprietary use
b) samba + kerberos programmers complain that they are stifling interoperability via embrace and extend. Even if they claim or are not attempting to in this case, they are
c) that is their right
d) people post copyrighted and protected via DMCA, whatever on slashdot. It is legally protected. It must be censored through either MS asking each person to allow slashdot to take their comments down, or slashdot doing that themself, as this is copyrighted and protected information posted here.
e) slashdot whines, blah blah, MS plays the little angel, lying and saying that it is a red herring, a complete lie, whatever, completely ignoring the real issue at hand
f) MS completely ignores the legitimate complaint from the Samba team; slashdot goes of on rants that are completely unrelated to this issue
DISCLAIMER:
I do not know what the formal or informal relationship was between MS and the kerberos team, so I do not know if they were not acting in good faith
The most annoying (and the best) part of /. is that the people who read it are so intelligent. My IQ has been measured as well into the top 1%, but that still means that there are thousands of people on /. who are cleverer than I am. This makes for some very interesting discussions, but it's a bit frustrating :)
Also, any subject I consider myself to have some expertise on is always bettered by someone else. If I quote a fact eg from an obscure book in a post, then usually someone else will expand upon it, tell me its history and point out a few exceptions to it. Sometimes it'll be the author. Its a great forum, but hard to get noticed, even if you deserve to be.
What would Slashdot do if someone posted the text to Jon Katz book "Geeks" (not just a chapter, the whole thing)? Would they remove those comments? What if he (Jon Katz) asked that they be removed?
I know that this is different than the Microsoft situation, but Slashdot is making this out to be a freedom of speech issue. I don't know that it is. I'm against Microsoft as much as anyone, but there sometimes seems to be a double standard here. Where do we draw the line for what can be posted? Or is there no line?
John
I'm not sure it's really censorship to say "you may not reproduce my material without my permission". That's just *copyright*. They're not saying you can't have a given opinion...
Now, when they get into saying you can't analyze their work, or discuss their license... That loses, and I think they already lost when they put a trade secret out on the web, because the "terms" of the license agreement make no sense when applied to non-proprietary entities.
But still, be aware that they aren't demanding that people not say that Microsoft sucks. They aren't saying it's forbidden to speak against them, just that they think you can't post instructions for "defeating" the protections on their "trade secret". Now, in practice, I think it's a little late for them to realize that, and I think their targeting is a little broad... Hell, a lot broad... but it's not "censorship" the way it would be censorship if the letter had read:
Please remove any posts which do not recognize Microsoft's glorious hegemony in the personal computing industry.
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
The emotion behind this editorial was earth-shaking. I'm truly mad at Microsoft. And that's a pretty big deal. Let me explain a little about who I am.
/. doesn't back down here. I'd love to see them stand up, but I can't help but wonder whether they would win in court. I think that the important thing is for *us*, the /. readers and people who don't like to see people pushed around, to stand up now. Personally, I think we (the readers) should mount a massive e-mail campaign against MS. How many of us come here everyday? How many of us are upset by this? A bunch, I'd bet. Now imagine if MS suddenly has their little Outlook inboxes crammed full of insightful intelligent e-mails from consumers. Like any business who depends on profits, they will back down.
/mnt/c/windows
I am a former MS whore. I loved the quality of Microsoft's products. I bought Office 97. I was a Visual Basic developer. I was a Win 9x/NT power user. I downloaded every update of IE that MS posted the minute they posted it.
Lately I moved away from that position. I even wrote an article on my webpage about the whole thing. (It's at http://www.afn.org/~afn51445/microsoft.html if any of you want to check it out and give me comments.)
I hated how Microsoft was bullying everyone. I hated how everytime I looked at their tactics I saw the pure rancor of Big Brother's face in some sort of Orwellian dream vision. I hated how Balmer had the gall to say that MS would never be broken up--even after his company has been ruled against by a court of law!
Whoever posted that First Contact quote from Captain Picard in that last MS article was right. The line must be drawn here. No more.
I just installed Red Hat Linux on my computer a few days ago because I just couldn't stand to let my machine be Windows only anymore. There have been some frustrations (if anyone knows how to get a Diamond Supra Express 336i PnP modem working, send me an e-mail), but I can already see a much more stable system than MS could produce. And more importantly, I feel better about myself. Finally, my software supports the freedom that I myself champion.
Having said all that though, I really don't know what we could do here. I honestly hope that
I'm going to send an e-mail right now. I'm begging everyone else to as well. This will only work if we all do it.
Rusty
fuzzcat@yahoo.com
http://www.afn.org/~afn51445
root@MyComp root# rm -r
"The further I get from the things that I care about, the less I care about how much further away I get." -Robert Smith
Based on the story, time of day, phase of the moon and the cost of tea in China, the signal-to-noise ratio in the comments fluctuates wildly.
I'm really bothered by this statement. I mean, all this time we could have been calculating the S/N ratio based on information easily gathered from the internet, and we haven't been doing it? Just think of the time we could save if the title of the story had a little "39% S/N" next to it!!
-Adam
A flea and a fly in a flue
Were imprisoned, so what could they do?
Said the flea, "Let us fly!"
Said the fly, "Let us flee!"
So they flew off through a flaw in the flue.
Funny, I don't remember posting this, but for some reason the body of your text says word for word what I would have said. (Right down to ACADR14!)
Its good to see other professionals out there appreciating linux and pushing the industry towards more open standards. Proprietary standards affect all computing professionals, not only programmers and their likes.
The hardest thing to understand is the income "tax." - Albert Einstein
I appreciate the emotion with which the article was written, and I certainly agree with the general spirit of the message. However, being emotional about a subject is not generally enough to be right about a subject.
It looks like I will be reiterating the words of other posters but perhaps they need to be said many times, because too many people are still missing the point.
Microsoft's complaint is PARTLY VALID. They released a document that was subject to an agreement. The agreement was present in the packaging of the document as well as present in the document itself. This right to control the distribution of this document rest with Microsoft, for better or for worse. This document was posted publically on Slashdot, and Microsoft is exercising their legal right to reclaim control over their property that was illegitimately published.
There are two things to remember
1) I am not commenting on the validity of their request to remove articles containing links to the document. This is a separate matter whose legal validity is very questionable.
2) Some people have been portraying this as some sort of new battle, pretending that the presence of the internet somehow invalidates all previous concepts of copyright and private property. That is simply false thinking. If you want to change property laws then change them, but do not pretend that downloading something that you are not supposed to download is completely different than for example walking into a bookstore and shoplifting. The result is the same, even if the method is not.
So what is the answer? Remove the posts containing the document, and fight microsoft in court for the right to link to whatever story you like. There is already a precendent for that and microsoft would certainly back down. And if you think that you are right and MS is wrong, then I will begin transcribing Jon Katz's books and posting them here for everyone to read FOR FREE. I welcome this opportunity to test the freeness of the moderation system.
Please remember, microsoft has nothing to lose in this battle. At worst they pay legal costs and open up the specification. That kind of loss is pocket change compared to the big picture. Imagine what they have to win however! They have a chance to show the government, the courts, and business everywhere how "bad" free software people really are. And the worse they are, the more bizarre the copyright laws they can force through...
Live to fight another day....
The system isn't perfect. We get trolls and miscreants tearing through the comments with comments about nude teenage movie stars,
This would be Natalie Portman, preferably naked...
breakfast foods,
and the scientific process of petrification. ... and we often like it when Natalie Portman is petrified as well as stark naked.
Just didn't want to leave anyone out.
Unfortunately, the moment that Slashdot directly or indirectly removes a post due to content, Slashdot becomes responsible, both in conventional and legal terms, for all user-submitted content on the site.
This is one of the primary reasons that the Slashdot editors have refused to remove posts in the past -- to do it voluntarily once (for any reason) means that they would be legally obligated to do so in the future (for any reason).
I think it's also important to draw a distinction between legality and ethics here: what Microsoft has done is to effectively apropriate an academically developed public standard, developed in large part with public funds. Think about that a second. Is that very ethical?
Ironically, due to the current state of law, what Microsoft has done is legal, and the public really has no direct legal recourse (the DOJ trial doesn't count, you can't add new charges after the verdict). Under these circumstances, while Slashdot readers posting the specification is unquestionably illegal, I have a very hard time convincing myself it was unethical.
In the long view, I think that this is (deliberately or not) about changing unethical laws, not just challenging unethical practices.
I just hope that the people posting the specifications really understand what civil disobedience is about -- they can be tracked down, and they should fully expect to be punished for breaking the law. As I understand it, under the DMCA, their circumvention of a copy-protection measure for any reason is a felony.
DNA just wants to be free...
It doesn't matter who owns it, whether it is Microsoft, Linus, Red Hat, or whomever. The fact of the matter is that a piece of copyrighted material was posted to the board. And the owner, in this case Microsoft, has every right to ask and expect that it be taken down. It doesn't take the DMCA to make that copyright violation wrong.
Let's say I posted the complete text to the latest Grisham novel. Would not the publishing company that distributed his work have the right to ask for the text to be removed? I would certainly think so. Its no different than Microsoft asking for their copyrighted Kerberos material to be removed.
Now as for the links and the instructions, MS will just have to deal. I refuse to believe that those things are illegal or wrong. The courts have already stated that links are fine, and instructions are also acceptable. After all, there are books on the market as to how to be a hitman!
mr.nobody
--Don't you wanna go where nobody knows your name?
My debate teacher used to joke that if you couldn't come up with a decent rebuttal to an argument, you could always compare your opponent to Hitler. Here we go.
;-)
In 1919, Germany signed the Treaty of Versailles. Its provisions included a break-up of the German "monopoly" on land, strict limitations on the size and capabilities of the German military, and economic restitution for damages caused during World War I. The German people were predictably dissatisfied with life under these terms, which led to the rise of a new government that chose to ignore the treaty. I can't help but imagine that if we were to ask Adolf Hitler what his motivation was, he would reply, "the freedom to innovate".
Any other similarities between Microsoft and the Third Reich are completely coincidental.
Vanya's Law: "In any culture without irony, fart jokes will be the highest form of humor."
Oh, BTW (my little piece of Civil Disobedience for the day), just use winzip to open up that piece of Microsoft shit they call a Kerberos standard and you can read the mofucker without agreeing to the liscense. In the same vein; since I use Be and .exe files are useless junk on my system, is using Zipomatic to open it so I can read it a violation of the DMCA (Interoperability of liscense agreements!?)?
"The tree of liberty must be periodically watered with the blood of patriots" -Benjamin Franklin
Flame on, I'm gone
Insanity is the last line of defence for the master diplomat. But you have to lay the groundwork early.
According to the Judge in the DeCSS case, any device which can be used to circumvent copyprotection is illegal according to DMCA- even if circumventing copy protection is not it's primary use, right? Now we have Microsoft claiming that there were discussions about how to use winzip to bypass it's copy protections and view the content without agreeing to the license, right?
So doesn't this put winzip in the same category as DeCSS- a tool which, despite it not being it's primary purpose, can be used to violate copy protections?
For example, I saw this post yesterday lost in the more than thousand replies to the Microsoft threat:
Dear Mr. Weston:
I certainly do not appreciate Microsoft's attempt to use existing laws to censor unfavorable comments made in a public forum. From all the postings that Microsoft asked to be removed, there is only one which might have infringed Microsoft's copyrights. I believe Microsoft took advantage of just one post to try to suppress lawful and valid critique, and I am very unhappy about that kind of disrespect to the Constitution and the laws of this country. I would also like to warn you that you made some claims under penalty of perjury that are unmistakenly deceiving and suggest a retraction by Microsoft of some of those false claims.
Sincerely,
....... your name here ......
Dear Mr Klein:
I would like to inform you of a new antitrust practice of Microsoft Corporation regarding its new Windows 2000 operating system.
Microsoft Corporation has purposefully broken interoperability with preexisting secure networking standards in an attempt to grab the portion of the server market currently held by Unix (TM) and Linux operating systems. To this goal, Microsoft has implemented an extension to the widely used Kerberos protocol that is incompatible with all existing implementations and keeps the specifications as a trade secret.
Recently, Microsoft made a restricted release of the specifications of their proprietary extension that requires the licensee to agree to use the information only for security auditing and not for implementing interoperable Unix protocols. However, when this information was leaked to the public Web forum known as Slashdot, Microsoft began an attempt to not only suppress possibly copyrighted information but also criticism and explanations of how the protocol works.
It may be of your interest to investigate this new demonstration of antitrust behavior by Microsoft Corporation.
Dear Mr/Ms ....
I am writing you to inform you about some portions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act that are clearly being used for a purpose that I am sure is not what Congress intended when it enacted it. I would like you to consider an amendment to this Act to clarify some points.
In particular, Microsoft Corporation is attempting to use the DMCA to suppress free speech in the public Web forum known as Slashdot. While there was a leak of copyrighted information posted to that forum, Microsoft Corporation is using the DMCA to try to also suppress criticism and technical advice offered by some posters. While that technical advice might be unwelcome to Microsoft because it concerns proprietary protocols that Microsoft is unwilling to publicly discuss, this by no means is a copyright infringement, just a possibly unqualified opinion.
I am sure the intention of the DMCA was to prevent and punish illegal acts on the Internet, and not to be used as a vehicle to suppress criticism or dissenting opinions.
Thank you,
The new attempt of Microsoft Corporation to suppress public criticism and dissenting viewpoints in the forum Slashdot shows that Microsoft is continuing its monopolistic practice without regard to the current antitrust trial in which it is involved.
It seems that a breakup of Microsoft Corporation is fully justified, given that in the current situation Microsoft is big enough to just ignore the United States government and judiciary and disrespect the United States Constitution.
The new embrace and extend tactic is using proprietary extensions to a widely used secure networking protocol in order to grab the Unix server market. When the protocol was made public, thus allowing Unix and Linux servers to interoperate with Windows 2000 machines, Microsoft claimed copyright infringement and is attempting to erase the information (and with it also some criticism and technical explanations) by threatening with lawsuits. The basis of its claims is the new Digital Millennium Copyright Act, which was enacted to fight pirates, not to suppress freedom of the press. This outrageous demonstration of contempt must be stopped now.
I hope you're willing to be flown all over the country defending anyone who's violating a copyright, because in reality the situation is no different here. Sure, some of those posts were not offending. If Microsoft knew what was smart they'd withdraw their demand to have those posts taken down. But they have every right to demand the withdrawal of the ones that actually do violate the copyrights, and there are some that do.
Second, Apple and Sun are _not_ as bad as ms when it comes to proprietary stuff, darwin (apple), solaris being open sourced, shall I go on?
but it's completely unreadable without any whitespace...
[/flame]
You do make some good points, but hey, as person "J", I tend to get very annoyed if my workstation slows down, much less crashes twice in a day. Nothing is more frustrating than tool-related lack of productivity (whether you are trying to be productive doing your real job, or something else).
The cost of the solution isn't the issue, and I'm not saying linux is the end-all of OS's (I use Linux and NT at home, and my NT box has only one blue screen in the last 15 months). Frustration is an issue, and some of are far less patient than others. Even if I 'get my job done and get what I want' at the end of the day, I will always note that I *could* have done a lot more if I didn't have to reboot my workstation / server / foobox a couple of times today. I'd be happy to get away from it, but not happy with the results.
A difference in personal standards. I actually expect something of myself, unlike many people in the corporate world, who seem to expect a lot from others and little from themselves.
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
No offense to Katz, but this editorial is right on with the Slashdot crowd. Also, very well written. We need more Emmett editorials.
Shut up you sniviling greedy twit. Face up: you simply don't have a right to M$'s intellectual property.
Look: Microsoft, as evil as we like to portray it, is innovative. Sure they may not always come up with the best stuff first, but they sure do take an idea and carry it out well enough that the majority of users select them. They're innovative with software AND with marketing. Methinks they've got the best (though bloated) word processor and spreadsheet on the market (THE top apps), their OS works just fine for nearly all computer users (yes, I hate Windoze as much as you do but that doesn't mean it doesn't do the job for most people), and while M$ should be punished for going too far in pushing their product M$ does not deserve eternal damnation for it. Innovation does NOT require that company A give their IP to company B on request without a mutually satisfactory contract and compensation.
As for censorship, what the %$#@ makes you think that M$ must give away their confidential/copyrighted, adventageous intellectual property? Yes, M$ asked /. to remove copyrighted material - so what? remove it! /. is the only group that CAN remove that information! The copyrighted material is NOT free beer, and when the OWNER of the IMPROPERLY published materials asks /. to remove it, /. should cooperate and not fly into a righteous snit equating copyrighted material with free beer. Shall AC post Katz's book chapters on /. for the public to read without compensating Katz? doing so is no different than AC posting M$'s book chapters on /. for the public to read without compensating M$.
As for the theory that the postings are the property of the ACs that write them and therefore M$'s argument is with them, explain why /. hasn't tried to compensate those writers whose postings are making part of the profit from Katz's latest book?
Freedom of speech (and innovation) does NOT mean that you have the right to use someone else's without compensation.
Can we get a "-1 Wrong" moderation option?
What if someone posted the specs rot13-coded? Would that be considered copyright infrigement?
http://www.club977.com/ - The 80's Channel!
Your source for commercial free 80's music!
Here's what really hurts:
At the heart of all of this is the BSD license. M$ changed some code and decided to redistribute it under a more restrictive license, as is their right.
So now everyone is pissed off, and wanting blood - but THINK for a minute - what you're really rebelling against is freedom - M$'s freedom to do as they wish with THEIR code, as defined by a license allowing FREEDOM. See?
If ya don't like it DONT USE IT. (Even if you do like it, don't use it, on principal.)
Every single person posting to this forum and bashing M$ while USING THEIR PRODUCTS should just shut the hell up. Vote with your wallet, not with your spare 5 minutes and a shout of 'me too!'
--
blue
i browse at -1 because they're funnier than you are.
So smart that you will vehemently defend the right for an AC to post copyrighted material, and not do anything about it?
This is not like providing a link to a tool(such as DeCSS or DivX), but providing the end product(Galaxy Quest/Metallica/Pam&Tommy). How long before warez, mp3z and pr0n appear in the hidden sids, uuencoded for anyone to download? Think carefully about the stand you are about to take here, the enemy might be attractive, and you may well want the opportunity to fight, but perhaps this is not the time. By striking now, you may lose a better opportunity to strike harder later on.
Be careful, don't get into a fight for the sake of a fight. This may well set a precendent where posts have to be pulled, but how is this different from articles which magically appear and disappear, because an editor has decided they should be held, or assigning a login an automatic -2 karma?
Again, if you want to be a martyr, fine, but don't do it just to be cool, do it for what you believe in, not for column inches.
If you have a comment limit set (i.e. browse all at/above Score:1)...
At the bottom off each story, you'll see:
128 of 256 comments -- there's a ~50% S/N
some of the science articles rank pretty well. I've seen:
146 comments -- close to 100% Signal
Assume everything at 0 and below is noise, and, while some of what is at 1 is noise, too, it's not a bad estimator - some of those posts at 0 aren't noise, but they don't always get modded up...
Works pretty well...
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
I give my props to the ./ crew for holding your ground. While many would like to see M$ brought down, that seems like a difficult goal given M$ wealth and resources. However since the ruling on the DOJ case, M$ has started to weaken. If more groups stand up to M$, /. being one of them, perhaps we can all bring them down.
/. rails against M$ and their attempt to censor /. and its posters. Here's a suggestion for Gates et. al, while you (Gates & Co.) are on the defensive, quit hiding behind you lawyers and have an honest intelligent discussion abut all of this, you just might learn something.
Good piece emmett, while others may think the editorial had little substance, I would disagree. If there was one thing I thought the piece imparted, it was the fervor and passion which
Perhaps what frustrates me most about this whole deal is that such a large segment of the PC userbase does not understand that there are alternatives to M$. And they do not understand what they are buying into we they are led like sheep to the slaughterhouse that is M$.
All those in favor Bleat like Sheep!
The reason I think it's a hard call is that I really think Microsoft has a legitimate claim that if they copyright something, and somehow it's on your site in violation of that copyright, somebody has to be responsible to take it down.
There are three types of things that Microsoft is demanding be taken down.
1. The posting of a complete copy of the document.
2. The posting of portions of the document.
3. The posting of links to the complete document.
4. The posting of comments describing how to open the document without running it.
#1 probably has to go and this is the point you've made. Slashdot can mark the single such post as -2 and it will disappear.
The remaining items must stay. #2 because the quoting in in the context of commenting on it is arguably fair use, but since the guidelines for determining fair use are deliberately not clearly specified, they have to choose between erring on the side of caution and erring on the side of freedom. The DCMA forces them to make determinations that only a court can make.
#3 must stay. A link is just a reference to another location. The contents of that location may or may not be infringing material. Slashdot has no comtrol over the other location and non-infringing material could be replaced with infringing material at any time. Microsoft needs to talk to the administrators of those sites.
#4 must stay because the DCMA section 1201(b) is not constitutional. I joked a few weeks ago about Microsoft suing someone on Slashdot because they told how to deencrypt the copyrighted phrase "Netscape engineers are weenies!" which had been encrypted by writing it backwards. The EXE file used to distribute the document does not run on Linux and other Open Source OSs, but the means to extract the content does. If Microsoft has given people the right to download the document, they have given people the right to read it.
The claims made by Microsoft are overbroad. The answer on three of them is clear.
Anomalous: inconsistent with or deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected
Anomalous: deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected
Canard: a false or unfounded repor
Second, the legality of the posts. Slashdot is a Common Carrier, and is NOT liable for the information on it, even if notified.
Along with this is the question of how secret the information is. If it's on the Internet, it's not a trade secret, so that is not a valid defence. (As the poster is unlikely to have been on the server itself, it was carried by the Internet to get to it, and lost it's trade secret status PRIOR to being received by Slashdot.)
Then there is the copyright status of the information. It's an interface, and interfaces CANNOT be copyright. (Apple vs Microsoft.)
In conclusion, the licence itself is illegal, the posts may not be but Slashdot is not liable, and all precidents indicate that the posts -were- legal.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
The best result that I can see coming from this is a gaping hole where Microsoft's copyrighted text used to be, followed by a careful paraphrase of the trade secrets in the excised document. A link to this should be prominently displayed for a year or two on Slashdot's home page. Fair use quotes and links should definitely not be touched, and neither should the various posts which explain how various archive programs can bypass the security.
Maybe we can argue that WinZip is in the same category as DeCSS - and force Microsoft to remove it and all links to it!
Revenge is a dish best served cold -- grits should be served hot!
Why was Kerberos not GPL'd?
Why did the dev team trust Microsoft?
maker
itbwtcl
Any additions?
Presenting the Microsoft Hall of Innovation
===================================
Close Combat
Popular game purchased from Atomic Games
Flight Simulator
Purchased from the Bruce Artwick Organisation
Age of Empires
Collabaration with Ensemble studios(Gopal R S)
FrontPage
Microsoft's HTML editor was purchased from Vermeer Technologies in 1996
FoxPro
This database application came along with Microsoft's purchase of Fox Software in 1986
Internet Explorer
Desperate to play catch-up in the fast-moving Internet world Microsoft licensed code from Spyglass Inc one ofthe two licensees of the
original Mosaic code base in 1995 and called it MSIE Microsoft then proceeded to distribute MSIE for free denying Spyglass substantial royalties for their key contribution to the product
MS-DOS
The original Microsoft cash cow this CPM clone then called Q-DOS was purchased from the Seattle Computer Company in 1981 Microsoft then proceeded to thwart Seattle Computer's license rights to the product The tiny company sued Microsoft and prevailed in court
Object Linking Environment OLE
Microsoft settled a suit with Wang Labs over patent infringement code portions of OLE which is also the heart of Microsoft's ActiveX
PowerPoint
This presentation software package was renamed and re branded after Microsoft's purchase of Forethought Inc in 1987
SQL Server
This important database product is based on code purchased from Sybase in 1988
Visual Basic
Ruby the foundation for Microsoft's highly important Visual Basic product was purchased from Cooper Software in 1991
Visual C
Microsoft purchased the Lattice C code compiler which became Visual C Microsoft's software development environment
Visual SourceSafe
Purchased from OneTree Software Shortly after OneTree's SourceSafe was released Microsoft preannounced a similar application called Microsoft Delta which failed to sell Microsoft then purchased OneTree and renamed
SourceSafe as Microsoft Visual SourceSafe
Windows
Technologies used in Windows multitasking came to Microsoft with their purchase of Dynamical Systems in 1986 Portions of the interface were licensed from Apple Computer also in 1986
XENIX
Microsoft's version of Unix was actually written under contract by the Santa Cruz Operation(SCO)
The Intellimouse, which Goldtouch is now suing for patent violations over. Seems Goldtouch had a meeting with M$ and tried to sell them their ergonomic mouse technology. M$ didn't buy, but 6 months later released a mouse which looked remarkably simular...
I just remembered this old Metallica song. . .
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
I think this is a hard call. The reason I think it's a hard call is that I really think Microsoft has a legitimate claim that if they copyright something, and somehow it's on your site in violation of that copyright, somebody has to be responsible to take it down.
I'd agree with you, except that in this case I have to question the legitimacy of the licencing terms Microsoft is attempting to apply, since it's readily apparent to all that this is just part of a strategem to subvert the public Kerberos protocol. Considering that Microsoft is officially a monopolist, I think that makes the licence terms illegal, don't you? And that gives us not only the right, but the duty to violate them.
--
Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
Where did you hear about this "require[ing] cars to have stickers showing local residency to drive in some neighborhoods near MS land" Got a link?
Molog
So Linus, what are we doing tonight?
So Linus, what are we going to do tonight?
The same thing we do every night Tux. Try to take over the world!
That said, I think you have the weight of US copyright law against you, and I don't think anything is going to change that law.
tee-hee. Anything is a lot of stuff. Anything can change Everything. Particle Man beats Universe Man.
Particle man could fight Universe man, but he'd get his ass kicked. With no help of joining forces, there's really no hope for Particle man. Pity him.
E-mail me to join forces.
--
+&x
1) "...a free forum that tends to bring the cream to the top of the chaos."
/. Editorial Crew are split on this issue then all my fears about the Slashdot takeover(s) have come true. Even if Andover decided to do the right thing, the fact that the right answer wasn't obvious AND that Andover could veto Taco is evil itself. (yes, I meant to bold all of that)
Well....as long as by "cream" you mean "most widely popular". And using that definition Windows is also the cream.
2) "I'm hoping that Andover.Net takes this to court."
Hoping? Hoping?? If there is even a smidgen of a chance that Andover and the
--
Have Exchange users? Want to run Linux? Can't afford OpenMail?
Linux MAPI Server!
http://www.openone.com/software/MailOne/
(Exchange Migration HOWTO coming soon)
Why do people still cling to IQ scores as some sort of measure of their worth?
IQ testing has no basis in real science. "Intelligence" is a highly subjective matter and scoring well on an IQ test indicates nothing other than you scored well on an IQ test. If you take this as proof that you are smarter than the other 99% of the population, I feel sorry for you.
IQ testing belongs in the same category of pseudo-science as Myers-Briggs personality profiles and the Minnesota Multiphasic test. These tests are inevitably skewed by what their creators see as "extrovert", "normal", or "intelligent".
Furthermore, a high IQ score is no guarantee that you are acting on *correct* information. In the matter of Slashdot vs. Microsoft, IQ has very little to do with anything. This is a matter based on law and such intangibles as freedom of speech.
In fact, most articles on Slashdot are sensationalistic "What is is your opinion?" articles. The value of comments is more dependent on the commenter's information than on his/her "intelligence". The alleged high IQ scores of Slashdotters does not give them immunity from being misinformed or irrational.
More Slashdotters would do their arguments a favor by backing them with correct information rather than the flawed assumption they are right because they have a high IQs.
Here is a Slashdot paradox for their high-IQ readership to ponder:
"Comments are owned by the poster." Therefore, Slashdot is not responsible when AC or a user posts copyrighted information on the site.
How, then, is it permitted for Slashdot editors and Jon Katz to reproduce these same works in another copyrighted work (a book) without permission from the poster? The argument, "It's too difficult to do this," is hardly justification. If it's too hard to contact a work's legal copyright holder, the correct thing to do is simply not reproduce the work. I know this is beating a dead horse, but I still don't think Slashdot is being consistent here. Should it come to a lawsuit, this may very well be used against them.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
The problem with Microsoft is very simple. They have a corporate mandate of "embrace and extend". This is a philosophy whereby a dominant technology is accepted by M$ into their system and is then extended with proprietary,
platform-specific hooks which prevent non-M$ users from interacting with previously standard technologies. They have employed this strategy with JavaScript, with Java, with TCI/IP[!], and now with Kerberos. This is detrimental to the goal of truly standardized software that is open and free for all. It prevents users of non-M$ systems from interacting with users of
M$ systems effectively and produces what Microsoft terms FUD [Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt].
FUD is the core of Microsoft's marketing strategy.
Once FUD is in place, M$ can point the finger at [Java,Netscape,Kerberos] and say "They did it." This is the reason Sun sued M$, the reason Netscape fell into AOL's greedy maw and now the reason Slashdot is going to kick M$'s ass over the Internet wide cryptographic standard known as Kerberos. It's not just the rebooting that pisses me off, it's the whole subversive system they have in place that's made my software development life suck balls for years. End
users are almost never aware of what really goes on behind the scenes. They just see the pretty windows and think everything's OK. Think about it this way...they deliberately make incompatible versions of simple file formats so that you are forced to upgrade simply to read [for example] an M$ Excel file. They are not producing value-added functionality, they are not making
a magic new Excel format that can do more things, they are rendering essentially the same file format incompatible by bloating it with
unpublished additions. Bloating being the key term.
They send mangled TCP/IP packets increasing network traffic exponentially by
forcing servers to re-transmit packets like there's no tomorrow. An NT network is often its own worst enemy. They can't make a scripting language that doesn't open your ass up to every script kiddie on the Net. ActiveX happens to be a really good way to make Internet viruses [now why wouldn't they wanted distributed software that works well...because then less people
would buy Office if they could just rent a Word program for an hour or two via the Web, pay 50 cents and be done with?].
I've watched so much expensive software fall to its knees like a crack ho in a back alley. Why? Because the systems were Java tied to M$. No other reason. And Java was NOT the problem. You can build stable systems in pure Java.
Caveat emptor.
The objection to posting the entire spec is likely legitimate, but the objection to excerpts and Winxip instructions should be fought. The DMCA forbids us from reading an ostensibly published work if we don't comply with copyright-holder imposed "access control devices." It directly prevents us from speaking about those works.
We should be fighting Microsoft's absurd attempt to claim trade secret status in a publicly available document. Like the DMCA, it completely contradicts the nature of "publication."
-- visit Openlaw for more --
-- Openlaw: Fighting for fair use and the public domain
> According to the Judge in the DeCSS case, any
> device which can be used to circumvent
> copyprotection is illegal according to
> DMCA- even if circumventing copy protection is
> not it's primary use, right?
So essentially every (de)compression utility for every operating system could potentially be used to cirvumvent some kind of copy protection, and therefor be illegal under the DMCA..
Someone should copywrite a 5 line piece of nothing, then secure it with an EULA that excludes everyone, and make many different copies with many different compression schemes that are self extracting. Then, they should sue the makers of the compression schemes (in a group if possible) and force the law to strike down the DMCA, since we know nothing really gets done outside of trial.
-- sudo.ca
Well, if you wanted to get the internet pissed at you, IE was a good start. ISS picked up the administrators, and your laughable attempts at security made us all livid. This is just the last straw with many of us.
.EXE) that can be opened with any number of free unzip programs. If this doesn't frighten anyone away from your 'security' solutions, I don't know what will. This is the perfect example of how much people should trust you, if you can't even protect your own data.
Let's recap, you take a public, standard security protocol (one I'm fond of no less) and make your own modifications to it. I'm not sure what on earth made you feel you had the authority to do that, considering that your Benny Hill-like attempts at security are already well documented. Any sysadmin that trusts MS modifications to an already proven technology needs to consider another line of work.
Unless you just got into computer, you know that Microsoft's only motivation in this was to attempt to lock out other competing clients (I understand this isn't your first attempt at this trick, is it?), not to innovate. By the way, thank you for completly removing any meaning from that word. I know few people in the computer industry that can say "innovate" and keep a straight face thanks to you.
Back to the current problem. You publish your undesired changes to this protocol in such a way that you think users would have to agree to a restrictive license to read it. This way you can destroy anyone who creates a solution compatible to yours, claiming they violated the agreement.
Now (and here is the REALLY funny part), you place this 'restricted' information in a well documented, standard file format (zipped
So the cat is out of the bag. Once again the collective intelligence of the internet is miles above you, and you are once again being laughed at for having no concept of security and losing a trade secret to boot. I can understand perfectly why litigation is your only option in this case, it's the only skill you company has left. The only "innovation" is coming from your lawyers these days.
However, this is where you lose. There is nothing wrong with posting a perfectly legal, common, and (in the case of binaries on a windows machine), desirable method of opening a file. I'm sure the poster who posted the contents of the file opened it using winzip, completly unaware that there even was some kind of agreement. He probably just wanted to avoid executing a binary from a untrustworthy company (go ahead, try proving me wrong). Therefore, YOU HAVE NO CASE. No agreement was broken, none of this DMCA crap applies.
The bottom line here is, your own legendary incompetance is to blame here. Attempting to attack a small news site is only fanning the flames that are burning your company to the ground.
Slashdot crew, you have my complete support in this one. No NOT give up, make a stand against this monopolistic disgrace for a company.
Finkployd
Windows 2000: Designed for the Internet
The Internet: Designed for UNIX
Here You go:
http://www.apache.org/
http://www.sendmail.org/
http://www.isc.org/products/BIND/
You can also check RCF's #1 through 2000+
Most of the technology that makes the internet work, from email to DNS to HTTP began as (and still is) Open Source - I'd call that innovation.
The phrase "party line" brings images of Brave New World.
And maybe that's what we are facing. There's so much to keep up with.
Sometimes it's nice to sit back and be content.
I wonder if MS is innovating in the consortium model, except that they think they are big enough to form a group all by themselves. Remember the X11 R6.4 scare? That was with a history of $0 information. Companies like MS don't have any significant open minded background to work from.
Subject: Slashdot
A while ago, when I was more organized I was thinking about writing in to Ask Slashdot about the 'community'. At the time I thought it was really remarkable that such an open forum managed to stay coherent. I pondered the possibility of taking this reality into meat space. Even a little bit. Now I find myself of the opinion that things are coming apart. In far too many topics trolls make up the majority of visual space. Moderation seems to have taken a turn for the worse, marking posts because they are early. What is 'under-rated'? I love the idea, but Im not sure we can handle it at this point.
And the blame isn't 100% on the outside users. Things like software release announcements are getting a bit out of hand too. Something like the linux 2.2 release I can see. 2.2.15, that's pushing it. Is this slashdot, or fresh meat? Repeats of topics are silly too. I would be all for doing a search over the site before posting something new. Maybe when something resurfaces, a link to the previous discussion could be provided with updates.
time to take a breath and let the smoke clear
Consider the important big picture to this.
Kerberos is an important aspect of secure communications within the internet/intranets. To gain control over Kerberos drastically impacts competing operating systems.
MicroSoft embraced Kerberos, only to make off with the standard and extend Kerberos in such a way to make it fully compatible with only other MicroSoft Windows machines. After being caught red-handed, they agreed to publish something they should have made available openly to begin with. Also consider that MicroSoft only did this because the Feds were watching, otherwise these extensions would have never left MicroSoft.
MicroSoft then publishes these extensions, but under tight restrictions. The publishing is somewhat of a trick to make it appear that they published the info without really doing so.
These preditory monopolistic actions are fuel to the fire for the case against MicroSoft. Hiding these actions behind their "legal rights" is all the more reason to resist against them.
Sure Slashdot might loose and be forced to take down the postings, but the MicroSoft PR nightmare will live on during the entire time.
It is interesting how the DMCA so quickly is used for exactly what everyone feared.
In fact, I'm surprised Microsoft is being so nice to you all. Probably because of the public relations fallout they would face if they sued you.
In any case, the idea of knowingly facilitating the disemination of someone's intellectual property is far from free speech, its more like stealing. Disregarding someone's licensing agreement makes me wonder about the value being placed on "open source" license. Or should we just trash that too?
For a first time editorial that wasn't half bad.
Not nearly to the magnitude of a Katz rant and I for one appreciate it.
--Live Free or Die -- (M$ next add?)
..which just shows that the human brain is ill-adapted for thinking and was probably designed for cooling the blood-T P
This issue NEEDS to be resolved in court. Whether or not Andover has the balls and $$$ to do this, I don't know. They might lose; but the precedent is important.
/. many times, one must protect their intellectual property and attempt to enforce any restrictions so that they may continue to enjoy protection by the law. When it was Linus, many were ready to jump to his defense. Remember, the law protects the IP of the moral and ammoral alike. I suspect, that if Microsoft were to let this go by the wayside, it could be later used in court to defend use of the specifications by SAMBA developers or others when creating compatible products. "Your honor, the plantiff allowed this document to be published widely on the WWW without ever attmepting to limit its distrobution; Even its distrobution without their EULA." There have been cases in which a failure to protect IP in this manner have resulted in the loss of the right to continue to protect it.
There are a number of issues at stake that I see, and none of them has an easy answer.
Let's begin with the issue of "Free Speech".
It would seem that the claims of censorship are a bit misguided. What is actually occuring is the protection of intellectual property. Now I REALIZE that a number of the posts listed in the MS e-mail seem to have nothing to do with any legitimate claim, which did puzzle me, but hear me out.
Microsoft, in what I believe was an effort to stiffle work on projects like SAMBA, released a document they claim is a "trade secret" which one must aggree to a boiler plate license in order to view. While this is underhanded, it's legal. This license included a stipulation that the licensee must make an attempt to protect the information at least as well as MS has. Clearly, this was not done by a number of folx, as the document was posted as a comment by a number of people.
Now, you say, they didn't aggree to the boiler-plate license, so they are not bound by it. And in fact, you are correct. They are not bound by it's restrictions, but NEITHER are the entitled to the privilidges that license allows them, which in this case, is the right to possess and read the document. Now, NO PERSON is entitled to the copyrighted material of Microsoft without a license. If you do not aggree to the license they provide, you are not legally entitled to read the document. So now we have a problem. If someone illegaly posts a document (without said license) and I read it, am I in violation of the law? I never new the license existed, and am therefore not bound by it, but am I entitled to its priviledges? I dunno.
Back to my original point about protecting intellectual property. As has been discussed on
I sincerely believe that this is Microsoft's intent. I don't like their products or their tactics any more than the next guy, but this is getting out of hand. We all have personal biases about what is "Good(TM)" and what is "Bad(TM)". The law, however, has a different view. Legally, an attempt to circumvent an MS EULA is equivalent to an attempt to circumvent the GPL. The difference is that here at Slashdot the GPL is "Good(TM)" and MS is "Bad(TM)".
Please, lets all strive for more intellectual consistancy and less emotional bias--especially when we all decide to play lawyer. This needs a court case, and soon.
-fp
It occured to me: is there a reason when free/open source projects get started they can't trademark the name of their work? The right license would then prevent Microsoft from co-opting the name. Because, after all, I doubt anyone cares that M$ takes Kerberos and modifies it. Even if they want to make it inoperable with the kerberos standard, fine. But if you're going to break the standard, you should HAVE TO DROP THE NAME. Imagine Microsoft releasing "Microsoft Linux" (win95 with a penguin background). Would Linus stand for it? Or, more realistically, imagine them releasing "Microsoft Napster", with built in monitoring for copyrighted goods, autoreporting, and network non-interoperability. Would Napster let them co-opt the name?
What's in a name? With software anyone can take and change, I'd say quite a lot.
IQ tests are a very poor test of intelligence, I admit. I joined Mensa for a while, but most of them were thicker than pigshit. The tests are very subjective, like finding the odd one out of a list; creativity is actually a penalty.
/. readership are almost invariably more intelligent than you are.
However, that wasn't the point I was making; basically that even if you are intelligent, the general
And top-1% scores aren't much to boast about either: that means that (6 billion * 0.01 =) 60 million people in the world are more intelligent.
And I agree with the © thing as well. It's almost as if M$ were waiting for something like that to happen before threatening legal action...
Nobody is contesting Microsoft's legal right to make proprietary extensions to the kerberos code. The problem is that Microsoft is making proprietary extensions to the protocol and not releasing the specs so that other systems can implement the extensions and be interoperable with Windows 2000. Changing a protocol or interface affects not only the owner/user of a Win2000 box, but also anyone who is on a network with the Win2000 box using the protocol. For this reason Microsoft has a moral obligation to release the spec, more so because kerberos is a authentication protocol- no one is absolutely sure how these changes affect the security of the protocol. Regardless of which side is in the legal right the people who violated the EULA did the world a favor by publishing the spec openly and this is far more important than legal technicalities.
You can get a bit more information from the March Crypto-Gram
Despite motions in the direction of the Open Source model, Sun Microsystems and Apple Computer are just as guilty as Microsoft in establishing a closed proprietary environment. Microsoft is just the most widespread 800-pound gorilla.
It's refreshing to hear others out there who think that there are other companies doing the same thing as Microsoft. I loathe people who bash companies just for the sake of bashing them! Microsoft may be the scapegoat of the Open Source community, but they are not the only company out there doing that sort of thing!
Attention all planets of the Solar Federation! We have assumed control! - Neil Peart
The whole discussion has missed an important point, IMO. Just what is the nature of the extension? Exactly what incompatibility is introduced? My point being, if we discuss (in prose, not code) what Microsoft's extension does, we do not violate their copyright! Remember, copyright covers expression of ideas, not ideas themselves. This is the priciple whereby Phoenix was able to create a non-IBM BIOS, Gus Van Zant was able to remake Hitchcock's Psycho, etc.
So all we need here is enough detailed description of the ideas in the PAC that some industrious Linux coder who has never read Microsoft's document can code it up himself. Then the storm passes: no trade secrets remain, no copyrights violated, no one left on base.
... an idea, the fugitive fermentation of an individual brain ... -- T. Jefferson
But can that copyright hold? If, as other posters have pointed out, most of the material is already published by some other entity (original Kerberos specs), then how come Microsoft can claim copyright on it?
If the copyright cna be shown to be faulty, MS has no case left. Better check with someone who knows the (US) law on these points.
Another little legal detail: It may be that the click-through EULA has some legal validity in the US of A. But as long as it can be stipulated that the AC who posted the offending material did so from somewhere else, the EULA will probably not be worth the paper its printed on.
Still, I hope MS will loose this case cleanly, and not to technical details like this. Keep up the spirit!
Heikki Levanto
In Murphy We Turst
I think many of the posts are arguing the legal/ethical nature of the original posts.
The fundamental issue here is freedom of speech, pure and simple.
There are myriad of ways that I can send illegal information: Phone, Mail, Modem, DSL/Cable, Carrier Pigion, or maybe even Slashdot. One could even post the code to DeCSS on the wall in a bathroom of a nightclub. Now ask yourself: If censorship applies to an island of free speech, where doesn't it apply?
I believe that the only censorship ever allowed, must be users' ability to revoke their comments when contacted directly. Honestly: I'm not sure how to deal with anonymous users...
Freedom of speech is critical to:
Innovation
Whistle Blowing
ie: Tobacco(health), Nike(slave labor), etc...
Oh, don't forget:
That small document: The Constitution
There are three types of things that Microsoft is demanding be taken down.
... and there are three types of people in this world, those who can count, and those who can't.
Sorry, couldn't resist =)
-- Dr. Eldarion --
It's not what it is, it's something else.
What's even more fun to do is to change your email address in your preferences to a Microsoft one so their employees who are paid to check up on Slashdot will constantly tell their bosses about their leaking brethren and sistern and suddenly all their resources are wasting more of the empire's money trying to root out phantom employees. HA!
:-)
...and besides, dictators are afraid of the truth. (Especially when it comes to having to admit how much abuse they suffered as a child...just ask Hitler. ;-) )
Of course the most fun of all is to be a temp employee. Just slap an "a-" and then the first three letters of your first name and the initial of your last name on and smack a "@microsoft" at the end and VOILA! You, too, can be a phantom employee.
So if your name is Bob Jones just change your email address in your preferences to a-bobj@microsoft.com.
A few years ago I reposted a "Bill Gates = Hitler" post I sent to an acquaintance at Microsoft to an online computer magazine and it only took two days for my acquaintance to get called into his office when his bosses boss said that his email address was found as part of the post. Oops! A sloppy header editing job on my part almost cost him his job. And even though his boss understood the mistake, his bosses boss wanted his head on a platter. In the end, no, he didn't lose his job.
Imagine what fun we could all have if all slashdoters change their email address in their preferences to those of faux Microsoft employees?
Because isn't the best way to fight paranoia to simply increase the paranoia?
All kidding aside though, this is pretty indicative of just how much Bill Gates does not get the Internet, not to mention the Tao. He'll be last century's news by the end of the year.
I quibble with the "bright line" distinction that this AC draws. Restricting a person from publishing certain materials on the ground that they are copyrighted can be, in certain circumstances, a violation of that person's First Amendment rights. The question is what those circumstances are. (Harper & Row v. Nation Enterprises, 471 U.S. 539 (1985) discusses this issue in some detail.)
With respect to MS's complete description of their modified spec, however, this doesn't seem to be even a close case. Whether MS has protected their trade secret is irrelevant. I can still copyright my explanation of my grandmother's pound cake recipe even if everyone in the county knows the recipe.
They can only hire lawyers to try to persuade the government to force someone to do something or stop doing something.
I think Microsoft is not doing anything that any other company wouldn't do if they were in Microsoft's position.
If slashdot posters tried to fight the government as hard as they try to fight Microsoft, maybe then something would change.
Ya know what, I'm not one for censorship. I was against the CDA and the COPA back in the day. And I'm none too fond of the DMCA either. But let's face the facts here, whether you want to hear it or not...
THE DMCA WAS PASSED INTO LAW
Microsoft is merely following the provisions of the DMCA. Maybe if the DMCA wasn't passed into law, Microsoft would have one less leg to stand on. Rather than whine about Microsoft in traditional Slashdot-bias-fashion, why not actually do something about Microsoft's legal leg, the DMCA? Go contact your congressional representative, and tell them why the DMCA sucks. Bet you haven't done that yet, have you Emmett?
Your editorial may have been good enough to raise the ire of all of the teenage Katz groupies who think they're so 3l33t because they have Napster and can write 3l33t 5kR1PtZ!!1!, but that's all it's good for. Get off your fucking soapbox, and DO SOMETHING Emmett.
The last thing Slashdot needs is another Jon Katz wannabe.
raunchola (at) hushmail (dot) com
--
The real Raunchola isn't cool enough to have any imposters
I'm going to abuse my karma here, because a moderator has blatantly abused their power and marked the above post as Flamebait. My post will start life as a +2. Let's see where it ends up.
Otter's post is one of the most insightful comments on this thread. The fact that the views may hurt your little "free-open-everything" feelings does not change the fact that what he says has value.
As far as the old Slashdot being slowly strangled, I submit that the face is already blue and the tongue is swollen. The old Slashdot is dead. This has quickly become nothing more than a warez site with a radical political agenda. Pushing for better and more open solutions has taken a backseat to "Fight the man! Down with intellectual property! Gimmie what I want for free!"
I'd like to see what happens when some of these brave anti-establishment freedom fighters start posting complete articles from 2600.org and redhat.com. Better yet, maybe Microsoft should do that. Let's see how big Slashdotters are on "Free Speech" when it affects someone on their side of the fence.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
In other discussions users have commented on the alledged impending demise of USENET, citing sites such as this as a better, less noise environment in which to conduct public discussion.
Alas, how quickly we forget the strengths of the distributed USENET news paradigm vs. the centralized, single-point-of-attack approach that all web-based discussion forums suffer from. Where is USENET? On some tens of thousands of servers worldwide. Where is slashdot? at http://slashdot.org. Which one is easier to bully?
Even the Church of $cientology was unable to get the content of the copyrighted materials removed from USENET after it was posted. They did succeed in going after the original poster by forcing finet.fi to disclose his identity, but they were unable to get the material offline. As far as I recall, they didn't even try. Why? Because the distributed nature of the medium made it virtually impossible. Alas, unlike FREENET, USENET isn't persistent - articles expire all by themselves and are then discarded, with the exception of sites such as http://deja.com, which suffer from the same vulnerabilities as slashdot.
This is why distributed protocols and methods for accessing on-line information, such as USENET and the newly emerging FREENET protocol, are absolutely vital to the future of the internet, if we wish it to remain a forum for free thought, expression, and exchange of information. FREENET is in particular important because it provides for a form of persistency which USENET does not.
I do hope slashdot fights this and wins, but we need to be actively looking toward the future. I encourage anyone who can to download the latest version of freenet and set up a node on their machine. This is one case where strength truly does reside in numbers.
Why not prod microsoft into a lawsuit and then challange the constitutionality of the DCMA and UCITA?
Let Slashdot put it's money where it's mouth is - help us fight these bad laws. Now that slashdot is a corporate entity with the means to challange such things, do us all a favor and fight this in the name of all that is good..
2. Let me see: Microsoft "embraces" Kerberos. It adds proprietary extensions to Kerberos that "breaks" the protocol for inter-connectivity purposes. Developers and pundits complain (even in mainstream conservative IT publications like Interactive Week).
A lot of people are eager to know the content of this "extension" to kerberos to maintain their software. So Microsoft makes the specs freely available on their site but with a funny NDA that make this extension to an open-source authentification scheme a "confidential trade secret".
Is it me or was that a "bait" tactic used by Microsoft? To use an analogy, it's a bit like if a bank leaves his door open in a needy neighbourghood and tacks a funny EULA on the open door of the vault...
It Microsoft again using its lawyers to dominate a market: in that case directory services and file-sharing services (Samba)?
---------- ovidius naso
(Somebody please correct me wherever I have facts wrong here--IANAL and I'm not very familiar with the facts on this.)
The article from news.com that CmdrTaco posted earlier stated that a version of Kerberos is available from MIT in an open-source format.
Here's where I want clarification and/or correction:
What license is the open-source version of Kerberos available under? Don't most open-source licenses require that modifications ("Extentions" maybe) also be made open-source?
How did M$ handle this licensing issue? Can you just do whatever they did? Maybe their "extensions" were reverse engineered by programmers who never looked at the original source.
Anyway...
If you can read this, then I forgot to check "Post Anonymously".
Normally I sneer at comments with a "Go ahead, moderate me down." My impression is that contrarian opinions rarely get retaliated against. But what's up with this? I write something that I think is a lot more valuable than most of what's gotten me 4's and 5's in the past -- and I get tagged with a "Troll" and a "Flamebait"? For crying out loud, I've been a Slashdot addict since before there was a slashdot.org. I'm just trying to keep my favorite site from running itself into the ground without any apparent deliberation as to whether that's the appropriate move.
And Freshview made what I thought was a terrific point in his third paragraph, and is now headed for hot grits land.
Well, go ahead. Moderate down anything that causes you discomfort. If you don't have points, post about how some opinion you don't like is obviously the work of a Microsoft Astroturfer. Unfortunately, when you get in front of a judge, none of that's going to do Andover any more good than Microsoft's market share did for them.
I'll even throw a +2 behind this! I've got karma to burn.
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Slashdot's strength does not lie in fighting Microsoft in the courts or in the corporate arena. Slashdot is much stronger in the ideological arena, and it is here where it should make it's stand.
So WHAT if Microsoft wants you to remove a few posts? It doesn't matter in the long run. If the open-source model is truly the threat that you believe it to be, if it will truly crumble the mighty giant from Redmond, then this legal bullying doesn't matter.
Sun Tzu said: The good fighters of old first put themselves beyond the possibility of defeat, and then waited for an opportunity of defeating the enemy.
If you pursue this through legal channels you risk losing. There can be no doubt that copyrighted material was posted, and judges do not care about your beliefs in open source and freedom, and common carrier status is not clear here. And where victory is not assured, consider other stratagems. Remove the posts! Meekly cry that you have been wronged by the bully with the billions. You readers will remember. Maintain the moral high ground while risking nothing. This is not the time to strike at either M$ or the DMCA, the facts being what they are.
The general who is skilled in defense hides in the most secret recesses of the earth; he who is skilled in attack flashes forth from the topmost heights of heaven.
In short, do not let your hatred of Redmond cloud your judgement. Free speech is a noble virtue to uphold, but it is not an absolute right and few courts in the land will back you on this one. Illegal activities on the behalf of AC's makes your position much less than pure. So instead of battling in the courts where you have the disadvantage, battle where you have power: here, on Slashdot. The Internet community is behind you in spirit. Build on this and better opportunities will present themselves.
I must agree with the bulk of posters.
The Full Agreement post Goes (-2?), everything else must Stay! It only seems right, fair, and just.
If MicroSoft want's to argue for more, then Prey for some enjoyable Real Life Irony - The case goes to Judge Jackson's Court Room.
Opinions Expressed by Me should be Forced on Others - PbHead
How dare you insult gorillas? They are nice beasts that mean no harm, not ruthless brutes that will attack anyone who stands in their way.
-- Faré @ TUNES.org
-- Faré @ TUNES.org
Reflection & Cybernet
If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of
exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea,
which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to
himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession
of everyone, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it...He who
receives an idea from me, receives instructions himself without lessening
mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening
me. That ideas should be spread from one to another over the globe, for
the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition,
seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature. . .
Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property.
--dangerous leftist Thomas Jefferson,
speaking out against intelectual property
Sadly, current law says they can, and are...And there lies the rub...
Neither should there be rectangular, colored areas of pixels that respond to a mouse press. And god forbid for pictures to be used with text to represent something as if advertisers haven't done that for centuries. Ever see a sign outside a shop? This is about Microsoft constantly claiming innovation ehwre there isn't any. Any more and they'll invent airplanes too.
Linux and Open Source developers are innovative because they're willing to go the long way around a problem to get the whole thing done properly.
Unlike Microsoft who creates a half developed Email client without introducing the to proper Email hygiene like Do Not Click on Attachments. You have no idea where they came from. ESPECIALLY If it says ILOVEYOU. And who didn't go the long way to create a SECURE scripting language as opposed to providing any fool full power to your machine.
For those of you who think the ILOVEYOU bug took hundreds of hours of intense work, go to Barnes and Noble and learn a little. Lack of interest is the same reason people get ripped off at auto shops.
The message on the other side of this sig is false.
I have been developing commercial software using Microsoft technologies for 13 years and they have worked fine, been easy to use, and they have been affordable.
Note that these are not my opinions. These are direct observations. These points are not up for debate.
Note I said they worked fine. I would prefer something that is better and cheaper - and even easier to use. That is why I am looking at Linux. Also, I especially like the virtues of open source.
If M$ were the police (which I'm sure they aspire to be) you'd all be crying entrapment!
/.'s fineprint: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. Slashdot is not responsible for what they say. So would those responsible parties please come forward and bend over for your stupidity?
I'm one of the biggest GNU/Linux/OSS zealots I know so I find it hard to believe that such a HUGE percentage of my peers would do _exactly_ what M$ wanted them to do thereby making themselves liable to lawsuits under the DMCA.
Regardless of what's "right", the DMCA stands as law. Perhaps this ruckus will have some impact on that law's standing but unless it does, quit your whining.
Please note tho that I still stand behind
Just because someone dangles a carrot in your face doesn't mean you have to pull their cart, jackasses.
Second: I have read the copyright laws. Both the original and the DMCA.
I say the above because of the subject.
The original copyright laws were created by people who were concerned with showing who owned ideas and their embodiment. The DMCA laws were created by people who were concerned with protecting the rights of companies. They are, as far as I can ascertain, meant to remove all rights of individuals when it comes to something which a company creates. Which makes them the greatest rape of the American people I have ever seen.
No where, in the original copyright laws, did it ever say that an individual could not discuss something which was copyrighted. Nor did the original copyright laws say anything about not picking apart something which was copyrighted. For they were not meant to limit, reduce, or destroy any personal rights. These restrictions are only within the DMCA. For over two hundred years our country has operated under the concept of freedom. And that your freedoms end where mine begin. Which is to say - if you make something and sell it to me, then the item is mine to do with as I will. Not as you will. Thus, if I wanted to buy a gun and use it as a hammer - that's my business. Not yours.
Now a different set of rules are being foistered off onto us by companies. Companies who determined that they could only enforce their wishes by changing the laws of the land. So only they win - and we lose. Such is the DMCA. But they are not the only culprits in this. Everyone who does not raise their voice and say "NO!" are just as guilty. For then you are saying "I am a cow. Prod me and I will do what you want." Instead of "I am a wolf. Prod me at your peril."
Last, but not least, we all know - each and every one of us - that several companies within our country are stealing ideas from other companies, people, and foundations. That they murder other companies (also known as putting them out of business or bankrupting them) who were trying to make our lives better and that they do other things just as bad. And then they turn around and say that they haven't done anything to anyone. They lie - to us. Day after day after day. Even when their evil is held up to the light for all to see we condemn not the company which did the wrong but the person or organization who found them out. As if it is ok to do these things so long as we don't have to sully our hands with the knowledge or maybe - think about it? So are you a cow? So is everything ok so long as you get something to eat? A little TV? Some sex? A quick nap? Play a game or two? Or are you a wolf? Do you really want your rights upheld? And I mean your fundamental rights to do as you please. Because if you don't fight for your rights - you're going to lose them.
The DMCA should be completely revoked and reworked so it falls within the scope of the original copyright laws. Laws which were never meant to hinder the free flowing of ideas - but simply to give credit where credit was due.
You have no rights under the DMCA. Think about it. This is the corporation's first major attempt to take away your rights. Don't let them do so.
Being a full-time professional C/C++ programmer for 13 years who is writing a book on politics and philosophy, I was very excited when I first discovered slashdot; however, I made two posts in the past that were insightful and interesting (otherwise I would not have posted them). They contained not one offensive word and were clearly on topic. However, one was moderated down as flamebait and the other as off topic. The only explanation could be that moderators simply disagreed with me.
That kind of moderation means that slashdot readers like me who dare to veer from the party line will lose interest in slashdot for two reasons. One is because no one wants to waste time writing a post if no one else is going to read it, and the second reason is that many people don't feel like they're learning anything new when 98% of posts tout the party line and often do so with inflammatory language.
The opposite is also true. I have seen posts that are very interesting get a 3, while a post that could not possibly be of interest to anyone except a publisher of an academic journal at MIT gets a 5!
This post will probably be my last attempt to share insight on slashdot. If you guys don't want my kind here, then moderate away.
Ok, I'm going home with my tail between my legs now. My apologies.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
This isn't censorship, it never was. I read the original unedited thread reading the Kerberos spec and nearly all of the responses involved how to circumvent the license agreement. I remember specifically at least 3 instances where someone posted the entire content of the Microsoft spec...
There were also some warnings from some that this type of behavior does nothing than to label Open Source activitists as immature children who like to steal other peoples work.
Obviously that point was lost on many as witnessed in the responses yesterday.
This isn't censorship. Microsoft has not asked that critical commentary be deleted, only posts which contain the specification verbatim, and some links to other stolen versions.
What I find particularly disturbing is how slashdot.org is purposefully misrepresenting this issue in order to generate traffic to their site.
Oh, and everybody go up and click on one of them ad banners to make slashdot's effort worth while!
It's one thing I haven't heard yet in this whole M$ vs. /. fiasco.
/. reprinted people's comments in book form, for profit. Where are all those claimants now? Where are all the people who were so proud of being John Doe #whatever, in the DeCSS brew-ha-ha? Where are all the individuals, standing up for their words and rights, rearing to take on their oppressor?
:)
Comments are owned by the poster.
Everyone was up in arms when
M$ should be contacting BlueUnderwear directly, not bothering Roblimo with worthless drivvel.
And why doesn't M$ just outright BUY VA Linux Systems, and get this headache over with?
-- What you do today will cost you a day of your life.
Oops, supposed to be IIS, not ISS. IIS is Microsoft's half assed attempt at a web server.
Finkployd
As for censorship, what the %$#@ makes you think that M$ must give away their confidential/copyrighted, adventageous intellectual property?
/. or anywhere else is going to get upset if they keep their proprietary API's private.
Easy! They already have.
If they wanted absolute, unrevokable, unopposable rights to their "property", they're welcome to it. No one on
But the moment they release they release that out into the public, whether they give away, sell it, license it, or whatever... they no longer have those absolute rights. Instead, what they have is a limited fraction of those rights, which are provided back to them to encourage development of other (hopefully) truly innovative ideas.
The question we have now is, What sort of rights are appropriate to give to someone when they have decided to release their ideas to the public?
Is the right of someone to suppress criticism necessary to the progress of technology?
A good case could be made that it has just the opposite effect.
Is the establishment of copyright on protocols and API's necessary to the progress of technology?
That would be a tougher argument to make, either way, and I'm not going to get into it. But think about it. It's no secret that copyright needs to be rethought. I hope this becomes an opportunity to rethink what our ideals really are rather than a prolonged mindless legal war.
Please, folks - give this a shot. It only take a few minutes to copy-n-paste these letters, and if enough of them get sent, they will get noticed.
It doesn't cost anything, it isn't inconvenient, and it just may have some kind of effect. What more could you ask for?
I do not understand how you could possibly think that the concept of intellectual property is obsolete in the digital age.
Are you saying that because it is not easier to steal someone's work than ever before?
I would have thought that the Xerox photocopier machine, or the Fax machine would have made this true.
Or was it the printing press? What about when the pencil was invented?
The concept of "property" will never be obsolete until we live in a Communist society where your thoughts and your work are owned by the State.
I do not wish for that day to ever happen.
BTW, your supporting argument is a crock of horse manure generating methane, as is your conspiracy theory.
1 post copied the entire document Questionable :) LEGAL!
10 posts discussed or linked to it
Final point: The kerberos spec is downloadable by anyone from Microsoft's site. To restrict posting of the document when in fact everyone can download it is to decouple cause and effect from decisions. That's the kind of illogical reasoning the DMCA supports.
The message on the other side of this sig is false.
I have to agree with those who say that as far as the posting of the actual MS copyrighted material, those posts should be removed. As for links, etc., those are perfectly legal and should remain. Whether or not people like MS, or like copyrights, etc. is irrelevant. The law of the land states that you cannot use someone else's copyrighted material without their permission. "Your rights end where the other person's nose begins" is a phrase they pounded me with in Government classes in college. Your right to free speech does not inlcude the right to break copyright law.
Karma: Non-existant. Due mostly to the fact that you smell funny and nobody likes you.
First, I must begin saying that IANAL. However, based on the little knowledge that I do have, I can see that technically Microsoft's copyright is violated by the posting of the specification in comments.
/. has to remove even the standard, then Samba's hopes for being interoperable with Windows 2000 may largely fall, and if that is the case, then the consequences could reverberate throughout the Free Software community.
However, I think this is a true freedom of innovation case (that does involve free speech to a degree, especially concerning the posting of links) because of the fact that what is driving this entire issue is the fact that Microsoft took a public specification and tried to make it its own property.
The future of Free Software and the GNU General Public License does depend on the outcome of this case in part because of the fact that Microsoft, by attaching a restrictive license to their "standard," attempts to keep information that can be reached publicly as a trade secret. The so-claimed "copyright" that Microsoft holds is on the so-called "standard" that they have created, and if this "standard" can be restricted, then the hopes of the Free Software community to develop interoperability diminish.
What is really at stake here, and what should be at stake in the DVD DeCSS case, is the part of the DMCA that speaks of being able to go above copyrights for the purpose of interoperability. If
Being a subsidiary of Andover, and soon VA, they have money. I'd probably contribute anyway, to be able to say I helped trash the DMCA. If a law is wrong, you really have a moral duty to oppose it in all ways you can, up to and including breaking it.
Hmm, slashdot has lawyers, and money. Now they need guns...
Communication is only possible between equals
I would disagree even that #1 is legitimately protectable in this case. The discussion was in regards to the entire document - among other things, enabling people to come up with an exhaustive list of defects in Microsoft's spec, so as to make sure they're not missing any details which could trip up, say, an attempted bridge between Microsoft's spec and the official Kerberos spec. (Whether or not such a list was posted, people familiar with the official spec - which almost definitely comprised a significant fraction of the audience in this case, when you consider who the hosting site is aimed at - could come up with their own list in this manner by reading the Microsoft spec.) Note the problems that programmers have run into with incomplete Microsoft documentation on other projects, where those details were termed "hidden APIs": they provided a competitive advantage to the Microsoft programmers who knew them when no one else did, which was one of the points of the antitrust trial.
Therefore, quoting the entire document counts as fair use in this context.
Speaking for myself, Slashdot has really opened my eyes to the world and issues of Open Source. I *really* appreciate how much this website has taught, and I'd just like to thank everybody involved, editors and posters alike. =)
--------------------- PeaceLoveUnityRespect ---------------------
You go emmett... Great editorial, it really opened a can of worms.
Our company recently sent this to Microsoft's "freedom to innovate" campaign.
Sir,
It is not only competitors who complain about Microsoft (Oliver Roll, Microsoft UK). There is a concerted campaign to obtain refunds for Windows licence owned but never used. When a consumer has no choice but to pay Microsoft a licence on every PC they buy regardless of whether they will use it, there is a problem with the operation of the free market.
Your assertion (on Microsoft.com) that Micrsoft's dominance of the PC operating system market was achieved through growth rather than entrenched position is hardly credible. Had Microsoft not had the blessing of IBM the PC market would have been very different.
Microsoft demands the freedom to innovate. They should be allowed this under the DoJ proposals. Given Microsoft's history of innovation, one has to ask why why they chose the word "innovate". Microsoft were late comers to the internet revolution, late comers to the GUI revolution, followers rather than leaders in the development of personal productivity software, web browsers, and web servers. Rather than create innovative products, Microsoft has a long tradition of either buying innovation (MS-DOS/QDOS, Hotmail, Internet Explorer/Mosaic) or copying it from competitors (Windows Media Player/Quick Time, the Windows GUI/MacOS, JScript/Javascript, Excel/Visicalc, Basic and Kerberos). If Microsoft were more open, they would demand the freedom to integrate, for this has been their greatest achievement.
Our company is displeased with Microsoft's constant changing of "open standards", specifically HTML 4 and Java. Our development cycles are lengthened by having to adhere both to Microsoft's standards and open standards. Until Microsoft support open standards on all platforms, we will be boycotting Microsoft software of the server platform, the only place where we have a choice.
No reply as yet.
That IS the real issue.
You are free to act in our society, so long as you do not break the law in doing so. You are free to write in our society, so long as you do not break the law in doing so.
Copyrights are critical to the free software movement. Without copyrights, and enforcement of copyright, the GPL would have no meaning. This whole thing reminds me too much of people who think the law should be tougher... as long as it's target is someone else. Free societies don't work that way, rather you end up with the righst you are willing to grnat others-- no more and no less.
The big mistake posters made was infirnging MS's copyright. It was also an UNNECESSARY mistake. Having reached the material without having to agree to a restrictive lciense, theyw er free to do with the infromation ( NOT the text, note the difference) whatever they wishd. What they SHOUDL have done is write their own documentation and post that.
I udnerstand the word "paraphrase" has been kicked around here. Please realize this is NOT what I am suggesting:
A paraphrase has a specific legal meaning in cases like this and refers to what is bascily a mechanical change of words and pharses for their synonymns. A paraphrase is derivative work and as such is still udner the copyright control of the author being parphrased.
What I AM suggesting is a new work of authroship. That is where you start from the raw information and explain it your way, in your organization. Any new work of authorship is copyright to that author.
The key to remember on all of this that Copyright protects the work of writing something that communcates ideas and NOT the ideas themselves. Do your own work and its your own product.
When has microsoft ever annouced that linux is the enemy? -never. They are not so childish. Matter of fact is that microsoft just does not want slandererous comments about their products. How dare they.?... -peace
Let's say I'm somehow transmogrified into the head of Chicago's public works department. Use your imagination.
:)
I give several thousand dollars to a project to revamp a dilapidated street corner in the Loop section of downtown Chicago. It's successful. Now we have a nice beautiful street corner where people are free to lounge around and do whatever people usually do on street corners in downtown Chicago.
One day, Mr. Bad Man breaks into FBI headquarters, steals top-secret documents, flies with them in hand to O'Hare Airport, takes the Blue Line El down to the Washington stop, walks over to the local Kinko's Copies(TM), makes several thousand copies of the secret documetns in question, and proceeds to then give copies of said information on said beautiful street corner to the people, thus jeopardizing the entire populace of America and threatening our national security.
In short, he is a "clear and present danger."
Now why the heck would the Government sue Chicago's public works department for building a nice street corner for the person to be all mean and nasty on?!
Sorry, this is just my rationale with the entire Microsoft(R) thing, deal with it as you want. It just seems incredibly pointless when you consider that analogy
-- BlueCalx | http://nickd.org/
Hey, guys,
I just want to add or rehash a few points to/of this discussion.
There is a very serious problem which Slashdot will face if it continues to pursue this. And that problem is simply this: a copyright holder has the right to restrict the copying of his works. Any copyright holder has this right -- it's the right to copy (or not). These laws are designed to protect the authors of various works, and the protection is as much extended to you and me as it is to Microsoft or any other author. This is something which seems to be completely misunderstood by various quarters of the Internet.
I have seen in a few places much reaction and claims to "freedom of speech" when dealing with copyrighted works. While everyone is entitled to his opinion, and he has the right to express it, he does not have the right to take another's copyrighted work and publish it. Rant about Microsoft all you want. Microsoft deserves nothing less than tons of ranting (and quite a lot more). But the fact of law is simply that everyone needs to play by the rules. Fairness, not favortism, is the intent of the laws here.
Those same copyright laws that protect Microsoft are the same ones that protect the open source copyleft. As the author of a work, you have the right to limit or allow distribution of that work in any (legal) way that you desire. It doesn't matter if the work is source code, an essay, a novel, a movie, a television show, an encyclopedia, or anything else that can be published. Nor does it matter what your opinion is of the author. If it's OK for the Open Source Movement (OSM) to violate copyright, then it's OK for Microsoft to ignore the GPL. Is that what you really want? The law is as applicable to Microsoft as it is to you and me. If Microsoft were to take some GPL'ed work, modify it, and redistribute it in binary form only, for a hefty fee, naturally, Microsoft would find itself faced with another lawsuit -- and probably quite quickly. We all know that someone, somewhere, is itching for such a fight against Microsoft, and I suspect that most copyleft holders would use the copyright laws to protect their own works. It is their legal right and moral responsibility (as open source advocates) to do so.
As a community, the Open Source Movement can defeat Microsoft and the other Big Brothers of Computing. But it cannot be done by violating laws. Any time someone (in the OSM or anywhere else) violates the law, it encourages those making laws to make even tougher laws. Why do you think we have the DMCA? The Internet is far too often used by those who want to violate copyright laws to try to evade them through anonymity. And I suspect that a significant number of slashdotters do fall, or have fallen in the past, into this category.
Fighting the DMCA, or trying to get it declared unconstitutional, simply will not work. Congress has the right to pass copyright laws -- it's in the US Constitution. Just because most of us don't have copyrightable works doesn't mean that we don't enjoy the protections that copyright laws provide. All we have to do is make something worthwhile and copyright it -- the protection is there for everyone, not just big business. And be aware that even unpublished works have copyright protection -- the author of a work is protected by copyright by virtue of his being the author; publication requires filing a copyright, but an unpublished work needn't be filed at all to enjoy copyright protection.
It is important not to get caught up in this particular trap. This is not a fight that the OSM and/or Slashdot needs to pursue, because it is not that important in the grand scheme of things -- or, even, at all, really. The fact that Microsoft has a valid copyright claim on the document itself and has notified Slashdot of the violation is the only reason Slashdot needs to justify removing the copyrighted information (only). And now, with the DMCA, Slashdot has a legal responsibility to do so. Just pull the actual copyrighted material -- leave everything else alone -- and Slashdot will come out smelling like roses, legally.
Regardless of your opinion of Microsoft (or the truth about Microsoft), respect the copyright laws -- at least, in public forums. Privately, of course, just don't get caught. *grin*
Theres plenty of +2 thats noise too.
To get the additional point you only need to have submitted enough posts that didn't get moderated down (I beleive its > 40 within a few weeks)
The guidelines for moderator status seemed to be based more on participation than anything else. Also if you hit the site n+1 times a day, you'll actually become ineligible for moderator status till you slack off.
With all due respect, your editorial did everything but address the real issue: Did Slashdot violate copyrights or not? This is Soul-Searching time for Slashdot. Will you respect the concept of copyrights or wont you? Bottom line. Don't let your contempt of MS cloud your judgement. And please don't let the Anti-MS religion that permeates the mojority of slashdot posts sway you towards making the wrong decision. If you feel some posts have violated copyrights then take them down. Be responsible.
Gee, if your previous posts were half as informative and on-topic as this one, you were surely wronged!
I think Microsoft is right to demand the removal of copyright material. And as other have said, Slashdot should have a policy in place for which posts they will refuse to serve.
For example, if I posted a UUencoded copy of a Metallica MP3 song, would Slashdot allow that? What if I posted Stephen King's e-novel?
Slashdot says that readers own their own posts, but this is not always true. If they post material owned by someone else without permission they are plagiarizing. If the New York Times published a Slashdot editorial verbatim without attribution, do you think they could get away with it by saying their articles are owned by their reporters? Nope.
Chris Dolan
There are people here who really think that Bill Gates is Evil Incarnate :). Well..I dont know..honestly, I wouldnt be surprised if he is, but he was to a main part the reason why so many people all over the world are using computers now. But that doesnt make it right, the BS he has done to get there.
:).
I would really like all of Slashdot just to move forward and not spend more time on these petty issues. If we could make Linux more powerful and easy to use on the desktop, then we might as well do it, rather than bicker on the side lines. The question whether a desktop OS would be important or not in the near future is another matter. Well, as a matter of fact, if Microsoft does not mend its ways in the future, and decide to truly innovate, rather than build its empire through mindless headbutting its way through, and timely acquisitions, then I guess we wont be talking about MS ten years from now.
Everyone has a right to be in the Computing Industry, the 800 pound Gorilla and the Cute Penguin. And Open source shouldnt be worrying about the Gorilla on the arena, rather we should be working to make every open source project a success, and better than the commercial solutions available out there.
On a more serious note, I dont really think this whole hoopla is about Freedom of Speech. Freedom of Speech is when Microsoft doesnt want you talking truth about them. That we do anyway. But, if copyright laws is the issue here otherwise, then we should do whatever we have to make our stand clear. Slashdot never stood for mindless copying or piracy, even when it comes to mp3(We end up buying those CD's right ??
I along other ardent fans of this discussion group, would never want to see Slashdot fall down in our eyes. And sometimes Backing out from the Arena doesnt mean that you have failed. We are only halfway through the War. There are some people who post here, who seriously believe MS stands for everything wrong in the World, Gates is Evil Incarnate, and MPAA should be hung. But, in todays world, the fine line between right and wrong is so thin that sometimes its very hard to find.
What we all should do as a community is to stand for what we believe in. Now we need to ask this ourselves.. is copying fair without the rightful permission from the author ? Whatever be the answer,When we have it, lets come back here and then stand together and fight against anybody who wants to shut us down.
Most of the times in battles, the side who wins may not be the one who sided with the truth, but the one who truly believed that they were right. Remember that !
www.hackorama.com
Rapid Nirvana
Put it in front of a Michigan jury. They can pull a lot more strings if you wait for charges to be filed in Seattle.
Ben Masel: 51,282 votes for US Senate in the Wisconsin Democratic Primary
We shouldn't start making this kind of noise until Andover's attorneys say that it won't hurt their position.
Okay... it seems to me the fulcrum of opinion around here is shifting to the idea that the posting of the full M$-ifed Kerberos spec was an infringement and as for everything else, MS can just sit and spin.
What am I missing here? If you're discussing how someone mangled the protocol, don't you have to look at the *entire* protocol to see what was changed and what wasn't?
If you're also discussing shady terms for seeing this information, don't you need to see them (the terms) as well?
With this line of thinking in mind, posting the entire spec *was* fair use.
So I'll ask again? What the hell am I missing here that makes posting the entire spec a copyright breach?
Anybody?
-Pliny
What does this button d$#%* NO CARRIER
Let me put together a hypothetical that has close parallels to the situation under discussion here and see what you think.
... whatever.
Say a university library has a public bulletin board. (The original, physical kind. Not a BBS.) Students, faculty, and members of the general public are allowed to stick messages of any kind on this bulletin board - for sale signs, tutoring advertisements, requests for rides home, poems,
One day somebody sticks the photocopied pages of an article from the Microsoft Systems Journal onto that bulletin board. Did the person who stuck the photocopy up violate copyright laws? Possibly, perhaps even probably. Does the library then have an obligation to take the photocopy down? If so, why? The library did not make the copy. What has the library done wrong?
Would the scenario be any different if the person had instead just tacked the original pages ripped out of the magazine to the board? Why?
If someone stands outside the window of the Today show on Times Square and holds up a sign with the Microsoft Kerberos specification on it would NBC have any responsibility for the copyright violation? Would they have to erase all tapes of that show (or at least that segment)? What about all the people who recorded that show on the VCRs?
Copyright laws face severe difficulties in this digital age (as we have seen time and time again). I would say it is time to have open debates on this subject in Congress, but given that virtually every member of Congress in the US is beholden to corporate money for helping them get elected I think I could predict where that debate would end up. What to do...
All four of these must be fought in court, with the expectation of losing on #1. It'll be OK to lose #1, so long as Slashdot is forced by court injuction to perform the moderation. (That is, does not lose its common-carrier immunity.) The other three, likewise, must be fought, but expecting to take them to the Supreme Court for resolution.
Aside from moral reasons to fight -- I'm not familiar enough with Andover management to know if they're sufficient -- consider how many hits controversy generates. (Ever looked at the way ZDnet does business?) Furthermore, consider how many negative hits caving would generate. Thanks.
-_Quinn
Reality Maintenance Group, Silver City Construction Co., Ltd.
Richest man, please. DOJ trial killed MSFT enough to drop Gates to #2.
Benjamin Stiglitz
KEScom Hosting
Slashdot can mark the single such post as -2 and it will disappear.
Even if the offending posts are marked as -2, the information is still sitting on a server somewhere without Microsoft's permission violating copyright. That's the problem. To remove the offending posts destroys what I feel is basically evidence (for lack of a better term). How will history look back on this? 100 years from now when my great grandchildren are studying history, what will they think when they can't relate to what actually occurred because "all the wrongs have been righted?" How can future generations learn from our mistakes if our mistakes are wiped clean? Maby a mistake wasn't even made here. History has always been written by those currently in power. Ask an Irishman and an Englishman the same particular question and you'll probably get two very different answers. Neither of them will be knowingly telling a lie.
The unauthorized redistribution of copyrighted material is unlawful. That much is true and I'm fairly certain someone is going to have to answer for that. Hang in there blueunderwear. Maby we can make a poster child out of you (pun definately intended)
"This is going to get worse before it gets better..."
There isn't really an undo button for precidence.
"The Probability of Mischief varies inversly with respect to the proximity of an authority figure."
to forget to use -w:
:)
Argument "Censorship" isn't numeric in ne at header line 1.
Argument "Innovation" isn't numeric in ne at header line 1.
Check Out Knexa.Com
Check Out Knexa.Com
KNowledge EXchange Auction
Actually, much more attention is paid to letters that are different, especially if they are hand-written. Zillions of copies of identical letters are properly discounted as a campaign.
...phil
...phil
"For a list of the ways which technology has failed to improve our quality of life, press 3."
Somebody at MS should go deep-six this stupid lawyer. He's too dumb to live.
Ignore it, folks. In the immortal words of some brit (whose name I mis-remember), "Sue and be damned!"
The DMCA is a load of equine effuvium.
"...they may harpoon us, but they ain't gonna pick us up on no radar screen!"
given your arguements here, ./ shouldn't do anything. You argue that well, they probably have to remove the copywrited documents which were reproduced in their entirety... But they don't have to unless microsoft specifically asks them too. What MS asked was for them to remove was that & the other three types of posts in a letter which specifically states that the swear under penalty of perjury that everything being asked for in the letter is true. But as everything is clearly not true, and therefore the entire letter as a legal document is not valid. I.e. if ./ contests one of the listed issues, the letter is contested not just the issue. If I am caught in a lie, all truth that I say must be viewed as suspect.
---
Flatrabbit has pointed out something very important here... how places like Slashdot, where the 'smart masses' can come to discuss ideas, concepts, technologies, hot grits, etc constantly challenge us to keep our eyes open, consider the impact of new laws and technology not from a company viewpoint, but from a cultural one.
I was very pro-'let the market decide what technologies were best.' It took my friends, who are some very serious open source/linux/BSD/Mac enthusiasts to get me to realize that so much potential was being wasted and destroyed because the very people who wanted to innovate could not do so unless they did it on MS's terms.
I don't always agree with the editorials on here. I don't always agree with my fellow posters. But I have learned a tremendous amount not only about the current state of the community, but also where our potential for growth lies, and where I want *my* growth to be.
Kudos not only to the Slashdot team, but also to everyone here who has posted real thoughts and ideas and kept the ball rolling.
Check out Magic Firesheep!
IIS (Which I think Finkployd meant), Internet Information Server (or something to that extent) is Microsoft's laughable attempt to uproot Apache in the Web server market. Again with the 'embrace and extend' philosophy, MS implemented common Apache features that, in theory, allow sites to be ported from Apache to IIS with relative ease. Of course, if you talk to any Webmaster who has tried porting, you will likely get screaming curses as a reply.
What good is a server without Perl built-in?
And God help you if you attempt to port a Perl script over.
Fortunately, Microsoft has almost no chance of gaining Web server market dominance for several reasons:
- Leam believes MS is C'thulhu in business-form.
/||\
__
(oO)
- Leam who enjoys every minute of the insanity he suffers!
Yup... there's +2 noise, but most moderators are more than willing to take the +2s down rather quickly... even if they aren't noise. [insert standard argument about how it should be 'Use +1 Bonus' instead of 'No Score +1 Bonus']
All you need is to be above 25 karma, and it used to be (a long time ago) that M2 alone could get you close to 30 points... never heard of the >40 posts thing before...
As for who gets moderator status, I only get it when I don't post for about four days in a row... but hey, I'll live. 5 points are so few...
[posting with the bonus enabled to see if I can burn some karma]
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
"All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective owners. Comments are owned by the Poster. The Rest © 1997-2000 Andover.Net."
So Slashdot doesn't even own the offending comments in the first place.
Of course, posting trade secrets to the Internet doesn't strike me as the safest place to keep them in the first place. Microsoft is guilty of revealing its own trade secrets, then. Hah.
I have never hated Microsoft more than I do today.
Why? Exchange. That horrid piece of monolistic crap, Exchange.
The MSCE nazis who run our exchange server refuse to open LDAP or POP3. So, No access from my Unix machine, no access from my Linux boot -- instead, I have to reboot into WinDOS just to read my fscking mail.
People yap about HP having a Linux client that speaks exchange, but I don't think they do. At least, it's not obvious on the OpenMail webpage. What do I have to do? Get the entire OpenMail package and yank the client out? If there is a Linux client that speaks exchange, it should be much easier to get ahold of.
Now, to pour salt in the would, the IT morons where I work have created a new payroll system. Guess what? It only works with IE5. Oh boy. Another great reason to reboot into WinDOS.
I hate Microsoft.
Treatment, not tyranny. End the drug war and free our American POWs.
See my user info for links.
Fight Hard fight loud. Make sure the mainstream press follows your story. Even if MS wins the world will know the truth.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Perhaps I am unclear... where is this going to be published? I certainly hope it's not just going to stay on Slashdot; the description of what we do and who we are is too clear, cogent, and sympathetic to waste. This should certainly be submitted to a few more mainstream publications (assuming they'll accept something previously posted to a public forum). Just a few suggestions...
1) Your description of the comments MS wants pulled is a _little_ biased. Many who read this will already know that they weren't just discussion, but actual code that may be protected by a federal law (albeit a somewhat dodgy one). Better to make that clear, or at least link to a more complete discussion.
2) General audiences might not recognize "!=" I'd change it.
3) Very strong ending. Classic, but not trite.
You have my thanks, Emmett. You'll make a fine evalgelist.
- Michael Cohn
-----
Go ahead, blame me... I voted for Nader!
Yup. You're quite right. Unix networking is great and much of it is open source. But what about end user applications? Is this really offtopic?
--
-- SIGFPE
(A) Imagine a publisher taking the MS specification and running off 10,000 copies, sans license, to distribute to developers around the world at $10 a pop. That's copyright infringement. MS could quite clearly get the publisher to stop.
(B) Now consider a "vandal" who prints the spec. out on flyers which s/he plasters on billboards, in coffee shops, and on telephone poles throughout the city. The vandal (AC) may be infringing the MS copyright, but is the city? The telephone company? The coffee shops?
No! But the mere fact that the Publisher (A) may have obtained the material in question in a "legal" manner (B) does not allow the Publisher to violate copyright.
Similarly, the mere fact that an AC has posted the MS specs on Slashdot (a copyright violation) does not excuse the Slashdot population from honoring that copyright (or facing the consequences of its violation).
Thus it should be entirely within Slashdot's rights to archive ALL posts, even those containing copyrighted materials (e.g. the proverbial screenplay).
Slashdot is NOT responsible for user comments. Users are responsible for user comments. And Users are ALSO responsible for obeying legal restrictions on the use of other user's comments.
Just like Napster, if you shut them down, another will arise. If you release the source code, it will be duplicated, tweaked, and multiple solutions will pop up all over. This is open source, and this is innovation.
The wheels have been put into motion. Those who ripped people off in the past (Microsoft, the recording industry, and others) will be the first targets when technology gives people an alternative solution.
The bad things is, if our government supports these companies, will the government force people to find an alternative one?
Well, I read comments. I even occasionally reply to them, but not if they're entirely devoid of thought or interest. Guess I shouldn't respond to this one, though.
--Emmett
But surely you must realize that even if slashdot removes the copies of the document (#1), there will be readers who will immediately re-post it. Even if it's attached to a different story. And there's really not much the Slashdot crew could do to prevent this. There's no way they could monitor every post without a staff of hundreds, and that's just absurd.
--
For every post, there is an equal and opposite re-post.
What would be the legality of opening system hooks for easy mirroring of articles and the following discussion so that Slashdot could have dozens of mirrors around the world? Then any article that was forced to be removed from one server could blank it but include a link to the article on one of the mirrors. You could even set up a mirror system that'd automaticlly select a copy of the article that wasn't censored from the set of mirrors from whichever mirror was closest to the user. As long as the mirrors weren't legally owned by Slashdot or it's parent company I see no legal way they could be held responsible. It'd be a sort of saftey for Slashdot as users could still access any post no matter what happens to Slashdot legally, by natural disaster, corporate changes, etc.
At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
Built up cases- As a rule, there are only so many lawers in the world. With the Government, 17 states and Slashdot/Andover.net on their tails, someone is bound to find the plug and power down the machine.
Open vs. Closed Source- Next, as we all know, Open standards improve and evolve much faster than Closed source ones. With this in mind, we can be sure that even more developers will migrate to open source projects and leave closed behind. This trend will eventually leach down to the end-user/AOLer level.
Open Will Pay- Until recently, only closed-source operations had any value outside of the university. Today with more media attention and student grants from sources such as the Linux Doccumentation Project, Free Software developers can earn a living from the very beginning.
The GNU Generation- Unlike Bill's generation, the new generation has had at least some introduction to Free Software (Linux in perticular). With all these new developers, GNU will continue to spread. And lastly,
Declining Popularity- As we all know, Microsoft Windows (winblows) is nothing more than a crappy GUI/filesystem module for MS-DOS. As you can imagine, this causes many problems, such as crashing, "illegal operations", etc. Also, windows/internet explorer is nothing more than 3.1's Program Manager with some 32-bit features and long filenames carelessly glued on with VB. Since Microsoft is a closed proprietary company, it cannot afford to completely overhaul the system-only jam more annoying features. The only thing holding them up is their monopoly and all the millions of crazed trolls they control with stolen borg nanoprobes :+} Already, the Evil Empire's name has been marred by the current and passed actions against their unfair practices (remember IE bundling? [still happens!]). As soon as the United Stated Department of Justice (DOJ) slamms down the final hammer, Bill's "Borg Cube" will have only a couple of years to live. Mabe three at most.
The Aftermath- After the "Czar of the Evil Empire" is dethroned, many users and developers will have to look for new options. Of course, most of these people will probably turn to a free *NIX such as Linux or *BSD. In 10 years, all computers will have open systems except for specialized ones for NASA or other governement use. These systems will be very specially designed for their tasks, so they will not likely work on any server, home pc, or embeded system anyway.
Sadly, many of the hardcore Windows users and MS staff will turn to other Closed-source platforms such as MacOS and BeOS. I also have a feeling that OS/2 Warp Server & Client may make a *slight* comeback. It is rumored that IBM will release the code or foster the development of a open clone within the next couple of years.
Adverse Effects- While the Open model will foster development, change, and community, there will also be those who do not fully appreciate Free standards or technology development. There will surely be a mass explosion of cracker scum developing more advanced and devistating ways to steal and deface computer systems, as they will have full access to the code and will be able to create destructive methods around what they find. However, the 'good guys' will also have the very same information and will therefore be able to stop them much more quickly, putting them on the level, at the very least.
Crackers aside, there is also the threat of some company or organization unfairly taking over the Market as Microsoft has done. This "rougue" company could even become more powerful than Microsoft ever was. However, it is unlikely that *any* company, closed or not will ever get more than 45-50% of the market fairly or monopolistically.
While these predictions may seem likely at this time, they may turn out completely differently. The 'Net is a big place. Technology covers nearly the entire planet. The only thing we can expect to be sure of is that things will change.
May the source be with you.
-----------------------------------------
Perversely greped and groped by PowerPenguin
#1 probably has to go and this is the point you've made. Slashdot can mark the single such post as -2 and it will disappear.
Or someone could reword it, and replace the offending post with the reworded version. That way its not copyright infringement, and you could even say it is a summary of the document if it is shorter than the original, just remember to credit the original document at the end and you should be safe on copyright.
Any sufficiently advanced man is indistinguishable from God
Not to fall into a trolls hands, or speak the obvious, but this is far from being simple 'Anti-MS crap.' They have brought a battle to the front door of /. They have decided to attack the people who run this site for our posts. They are trying to make a piece of open source proprietary. I don't like it when people attack MS as a knee jerk response either, but now they have gone too far.
Dusty Hodges
I think that there's a real problem that people haven't thought out.
/. case is worse, since the material was distributed under a restrictive license. (And that license was attached to the end of the document, along with an explicit notification of its presence, so there's no innocent infringement
/. souvenirs. I won't be reading the site in a few months.
Microsoft will win this case if it goes on, and even if they only win on the four posts which clearly violated their copyright, Slashdot will fold. Andover.net will fold. And VA Linux will fold. They will all go bankrupt. That's what Emmett and Roblimo are arguing for. Is that really what you all want?
Let's ignore the links and the instructions. There's reason to argue over whether or not they constitute infringement of Microsoft's copyright. They probably do, but that might be a test case worth pursuing anyway, if only to establish a precedent. The other four postings, which contained the complete text of the specification, are transparent examples of infringement.
Now, let me tell you all what's going to happen if Microsoft is forced to take this to court. The case will never see a jury. It will never even be tried. It will reach pretrial stage, after which Microsoft will move for summary judgement in its favor. The Judge will grant the motion. All that will get heard after that is the size of the damages that must be awarded.
How big will those be? One word: staggering. Think about the MP3 case. Now, realize that the
involved.)
Statutory damages for copyright infringement usually run in excess of $100K (US) per infringement. And EACH page view containing a significant amount of the text is a separate infringement. You do the math: say it's only a couple hundred thousand impressions, and say the judge is really nice, it's 1e5 * 2e5 = 2e10 = $20,000,000,000.
Uh, hello? That's quite a bit of money, and I'm deliberately low-balling the estimate. Given the editors' behavior, I don't think that the Judge will pull punches. Robin's note and Emmett's note show an arrogance worthy of Microsoft itself. He'll nail them, and the site, for that posture.
So now let's look at punitive damages. If Microsoft requested the infringing material be taken down, and the editors refused to do so, then the case becomes one of wilful infringement, and Microsoft becomes able to win that one by summary judgement. That raises the price, both by increasing statutory damages, and by adding new kinds of punitive damages to the mix.
Ironically, Microsoft probably doesn't want to win that case that harshly. They want wiggle room: take down the infringing material, and maybe apologize, but they don't want to beat you up. VA Linux is exactly the kind of competitor MS wants: poorly managed, hemorraging cash, and trying to control an edge market. Slashdot looks like a bunch of viscious little punks who've done something stupid. Make Microsoft pound you into the ground, though, and you become a Baby Boy Battered By the Big Bad Borg. They don't want that; you're much more valuable to them alive than you are dead. Carry on, though, and they won't have any alternative. They'll squash you like a bug.
Maybe you'll get lucky. Maybe IBM or Oracle will step in to save the company. Matbe Microsoft will find a way to temper the pounding you're going to get. Either way, it's an audacious bet to make, particularly when you're the officer of a publicly held company.
Bottom line? At this rate, maybe I should get some
Dear Mr. Weston:
I am a Microsoft shareholder, and have been one for the last four years. I have been happy with the return on my investment, and have been unsympathetic with the frequently held argument that Microsoft's monopoly has had a negative impact on consumers.
My viewpoint changed on May 2, when I first heard of Microsoft's attempts to hijack the public Kerberos networking standard, in an attempt to prevent interoperability between machines that use Windows 2000 and other machines. It now appears to me that Microsoft is using its dominant position to destroy the Kerberos standard, by "embracing and extending" with proprietary nonsense.
I would like to hear why these kinds of shennanigans should be considered anything but harmful to consumers. I would also entertain explanations of how anything other than Microsoft's monopoly makes this sort of technological vandalism possible. In the absence of any response from Microsoft on these matters, I am forced to conclude that Microsoft is using its status as a monopoly to harm consumers.
It is now clearer to me in retrospect that Microsoft's critics have been, for the most part, in the right. It is particularly troubling that this behavior continues even after it has been found to be illegal, as we await the penalty which will face Microsoft for its previous transgressions.
I am therefore forced to conclude not only that Microsoft has engaged in illegal business practices in the past, but that the company is unreformable. Their inability to recognize the corrosive effect of their business practices on consumers and the U. S. software industry as a whole suggests that they are a company with no moral sense.
In light of this conclusion, I find it is no longer possible for me to continue to own Microsoft shares. I intend to sell them next week.
Yours sincerely, shilo
Thanks for the info. That's what I love about /. and open source folks...They're always willing to help. :) Open source isn't a coding philosophy. It's a way of life. Rusty fuzzcat@yahoo.com http://www.afn.org/~afn51445 root@MyComp root# rm -r /mnt/c/windows
"The further I get from the things that I care about, the less I care about how much further away I get." -Robert Smith
Hey Emmett
Great editorial... it really does a good job explaining what's going on, as well as your stance on the issue. Is this going to be reprinted anywhere else?
Man, I was really not very confident about Slashdot's future since Andover's buyout, but this issue has made me change my mind. Keep up the good work!
--
This site will automatically find your representatives (if you have forgotten), and send them an email/snail mail for you if you provide the text (and other information). i thought it was cool.
I think the biggest problem we'll run into is that any potential hearing will be based upon the DMCA. In order for the real argument we have (id est, Free Speech) to become the issue, the DMCA must be successfully challenged in court as un-Constitutional.
Having looked over the text and provisions of the law more than once, I believe that there is a strong case for it being struck down. It wouldn't be the first nor the last time that a law has been rushed into effect, and people hurt by it, only to be withdrawn as illegal. I have strong opinions about the ethics involved, but they must remain secondary to the legal issues.
Of course, I don't mean the ethics is not of critical import to this issue. In fact, it is the sole reason that we are interested in this matter. We believe that we have the 'moral high-ground' and that we have an obligation to fight it, on the streets, in the press, in the courts, and on the battle-field if need be. Freedom is worth fighting for, under any circumstances.
"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." ~Benjamin Franklin
Despite this, the courts do not look kindly on people spouting ethical rhetoric during legal proceedings. The courts are concerned only with the issue at hand and the facts related to it. The question they are asking is, is /. breaking the law as it stands by posting comments freely?
With this in mind, I am calling on you, my brothers and friends, to find a way to bring to trial the illegality of the DMCA. It has been said before and will be again- the DMCA lends itself to un-Constitutional abuse, and must be amended or struck down. We must find a way to do this or risk the continued, expensive harrasment that must surely follow from challenging Corporate America.
~wmaheriv
~wmaheriv
"Shema Yisroel- Adonai Elohenu, Adonai Echad!"
I don't want to get a flame war started here, but I'm afraid this is gona' piss a lot of people off...
Many people are in the software industry to make money. That may sound evil to a lot of /. readers, but it really isn't. The same America which provides our covenanted First Amendment rights also provides us with a free-market economy.
As a result of this type of system, the people end up running the economy. The only way to make money is to cater to the people. If the people choose to use an MS platform, then software companies who want to make money MUST make Windows versions of their apps top priority.
If the number of Linux and Windows users was switched, then Linux versions of software would be available first/only.
Now I'm not saying MS isn't wrong in doing what they're doing. I believe they are a monopolistic company with too much control over our free-market economy.
But that's beside the point.
The point I'm trying to make is that software developers who develop for Windows are just trying to make ends meet. They're not trying to feed the company. They're not trying to stomp out MS's competition.
In fact, I personally find the Win32 API annoying beyond all recognition. I hate it and MS's business practices. However, I develop for windows as a priority because it's what everyone uses.
I know that if everyone stopped writing Win32 software, then MS would be screwed. But that's never going to happen. MS will have to fall by some other means. Then developers will stop writing for Windows.
// Spunkee
I'd like to know who in congress voted for the DMCA, so I can vote against them this November.
Your Working Boy,
If UCITA is made law, then how many organizations are going to want to take a chance on getting 'I Agree'd into indentured servitude? Since the EULAs would be given more force, fiduciary responsibility would mandate that they be clearly analyzed and their weight seriously measured in relation to corporate needs. I'm thinking unencumbered open/free software would start looking mighty nice.
Sometimes people need a sharp shock to get them out of their bad habits.. Perhaps UCITA is the bazooka we've been waiting to have M$ and closed software companies point at their big toe..
Just a little diabolical advocatin'..
Your Working Boy,
All right, this is getting crazy. People, let's stop the bible thumping for a minute and think this issue out. I'm really pissed off right now, so I'm going to keep this brief and to the point.
While it certainly was a pretty hostile move from Microsoft, and certainly not something that's going to win them friends among the hackers in the world, this email was a perfectly reasonable thing to send to slashdot. Let's everybody remember that in a medium like print, there is a spectrum that runs from free speech to plagarism and copyright violation.
Perhaps I should start putting chapters of O'Reily books on slashdot as comments? Or maybe chapters of the Cryptonomicon? No? Why not? Because, the laws that govern us say that the text is held under copyright. The GPL which you hold so dear is based on just such principles. Thus, it should be amazingly obvious to anybody with even the smallest little brains, that Microsoft copyrights their Kerberos PAC Spec, and then you put it up as a Slashdot comment, you've violated their copyright.
Period.
You have crossed the line between free speech and copyright infringement. Remember the good old saying-- "Your right to swing your fist stops at the end of my nose."
I wish I could go through and pick apart every line in the diatribe posted by emmet entitled "Censorship != Innovation". But it all stems from a single misconception-- what Microsoft is asking for is NOT censorship. It's a protection of their copyright.
So please stop the name calling and mindless drivel.
Please email me at j.doty@gte.net if you want to argue this in more detail.
Unfortunately I have to use Win9x/NT at work because the software that is essential to my profession is only win based (AutoCAD R14)
Perhaps you haven't heard of Matra Open Cascade?
This is more a library than a full CAD environment but don't kid yourself - sticking a good front end on it is something you can do in a few weeks with Glade or QT. So I guess that means we'll have full-blown CAD, open source, GPL for Linux within the year. Let me very clear about this also: Open Cascade is to AutoCAD as a Bulldozer is to a wheelbarrow.
--
Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
And God help you if you attempt to port a Perl script over.
Hey, at least M$Perl has fork() now...
(can't tell ya how that bit me in the ass about 1.5 years ago.. Glad it was someone else's problem tho, I was just resident perl nerd working late...)
Your Working Boy,
the requirement for taking the posts down should be requiring bill gates and steve ballmer to run (or walk) 3 laps of the andover building, while dressed only in barrels with suspenders, and painted on the barrels, GNU/Linux on one side, slashdot.org on the other.
of course, i hope your windows will open, so you can empty the dirty ashtrays out of them that day...++grin++
i was going to suggest naked, but we dont want to scare anyone.
Power to the ppl and their thoughts no matter what they are ....
--=.=-- www.cyber2000.qc.ca
After being nearly swayed in the other direction by the parent of the parent to this post, I was readily swayed back. M$ is vulnerable at the moment and if we can legally fight them on the question of whether trade secret applies (already published) or copyright (history of the code) we should. What is the worst outcome of fighting them? Cost of lawyers (any probono copyright experts reading?) to Andover? Andover should be able to pick up a few months of the fight without breaking a sweat beyond that I'm sure many lawyers would jump at the chance if it looks like we have a legal leg to stand on. What it we don't have a leg to stand on? Slashdot will have dragged M$ through the bog of public opinion at (perhaps) the most critical time in M$ history (One of the few times I wish a jury was deciding their fate instead of a judge).
Worst outcome for Slashdot: required to police their site for copyright infringement whenever notified by offended third party, wasted legal fees.
This opportunity is well worth the gamble. Lets fight on the seas and oceans.....we will NEVER surrender!
Remember we are not the only group fighting M$ right now, we may not admire our allies but they are allies and this is war!
no sig.
I don't think a protocol can itself be protected in a GPLish way, unless some part of it is patented. The name, however, is another story. Register the name as a trademark, and then license the name only for use with compatible implementations.
The US Department of Defense did something like this with the Ada name. You can superset or subset Ada all you want, but you can't call the resulting language "Ada." (I shudder at the thought of supersetting Ada, but that's a topic for another thread.)
--
So many "first post" idjits...so few moderator points... | Delenda est Windoze
--
Ooh, moderator points! Five more idjits go to Minus One Hell!
Delenda est Windoze
Ooh, moderator points! Five more idjits go to Minus One Hell!
Delendae sunt RIAA, MPAA et Windoze
Has anyone else observed this rampant suspicion of hidden Microsoft plants and been reminded of 1950s style McCarthyism?
My point is that Microsoft probably did not plant these URLs and copyright violations to subvert Slashdot. There are plenty of better reasons why other people would have put them there, say angry users bent on venting on Microsoft by flaunting their license and posting their content.
By now, Microsoft must realize that the best way to win the world over to Windoze 2000 is not by convincing hard-core Linux devotees with strong technical knowledge and little corporate power, but the IS Managers, CTOs, and B2B executives of the world. Slashdot is not their arena for this battle of mindshare.
I'm sure there are people at Microsoft who observe what goes on at Slashdot, but in the long run I can't see any vast strategic benefit to "discredit" Slashdot in the mainstream press.
People who participate in this kind of forum would only be encouraged by this kind of attack. In fact, this is great publicity for Slashdot and could easily result in a greater readership. Our faithful editors, whether they intended to or not, played a very stategic hand in asking for community response both in their comment and their letter to Microsoft -- not only did it help to polarize the issue and foster an adversarial metaphor, but it accomplished a particular politicized liberitarian call to action. I personally happen to agree with the cause against the DMCA, but I think we should all be aware of the very hot-headed way the issue is being played by all sides.
My guess it that someone at MS observed that people were cirumventing their EULA and knowing full well that they have to protect their copyright to maintain their legal protection, he passed it along to some poor desk guy who sent out a boilerplate message with a cc: to legal. It sounds a lot more plausible than deep conspiracy theories.
(BTW: I don't work for Microsoft, I agree they are mostly wrong here, and I hope I don't get flamed too badly.)
Most of the posts that Microsoft wants to censor said, in effect, "Oh, it's just a zip file. Use WinZip or WinRAR to open it." If saying that is criminal under the DMCA, than I sincerely hope that it goes before the Supreme Court soon to be struck down as grossly unconstitutional.
Besides, looking at the sections of the DMCA you quoted, I'm hard-pressed to see how Microsoft could make a case under it. I'll grant that the self-extracting .exe with the EULA is probably a technological measure under 3B, but provisions 2A and 2B hardly apply to the case.
A message saying to use WinZip is not "technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof", but WinZip itself might be considered to be. But WinZip doesn't meet any of the requirements 2A, 2B, or 2C:
Unlike the DeCSS case, WinZip is obviously not designed or marketed solely for the purpose of circumventing copy protection, even to a technologically challenged judge. So using the DMCA to argue against WinZip or advocating using it to open the .exe seems like a losing proposition.
The solution to this kind of embrace-and-extend
attack on an open standard isn't too hard. Basically, a GPL-like license needs to be developed to cover the specifications (not necessarily code), one that says that all extensions to the specification must be made publicly available with no restrictions to anyone who asks.
The IETF and W3C had better do something like this before Microsoft embraces and extends them (more).
"We shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in the US, we shall fight on the servers and the routers, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the courts, we shall defend our freedom, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the website, we shall fight on the newsgroups, we shall fight in the media and in the streets, we shall fight in the real world; we shall never surrender."
Just a though....
... Big Guns....
In no situation is quoting an entire document fair use. If I write an in-depth review of a new novel and discuss every single chapter, I certainly can't reproduce the entire novel.
Easy: no extension of fair use applies to reproducing an entire long document.
Take the example of an academic study of a recently-published novel. The study itself is quite long, and deals in depth with every chapter of the novel. This does not mean that someone can publish the study and include a copy of the novel as an appendix!
Fair use applies to quotes and citations, not to full-scale copying.
... being moderated up as another /. groupie I have to say that that editorial by emmett was one of the best editorial pieces I have ever read on /. ... concise, timely, on-topic and balanced.
Write more editorials please emmett.
Rob
Flag this one for redundancy, but damn it sure does feel nice to know that you guys want to stand up against this. Microsoft has gone too far, too many times, and this time they are really gambling. They MUST lose this gamble. We are here to back you guys up, Emmet. Give the word, us /.'ers will we out there doing our best to help you guys out like a herd of rabid wombats.
The main issue is kerberos, or more succinctly, the EU pending investigation of MS the tying in of the server (W2K) and client market; among other issues, kerberos (client/server) software is one instance of tying in the client/server. I find it difficult to believe that MS would shine a bigger spotlight on this issue. OTOH, the MS legal team has been a few cents short of a nickle; for instance, why did they absolutely destroy the credibility of Allchin(sp?) in their video testimony during the anti-trust case.
By claiming trade secrets for something that is suspose to be an industry standard, MS has also indicated their intention for embrace and extend. The EU should look into this. Additionally, industry standards (IIRC, I saw this in a MS ad with regard to kerberos) usually does not mean trade secrets. Misleading ads?
But the main thing is inter-operatability. EU look into this. Trade secrets hide the interconnection between client and server. Trade secrets mean the European software developers will be hampered.
Sorry for any typos, too late to preview.
That's not what was done, though. The materials were discussed and I believe in some cases quoted from. The fair use doctrine still allows people to quote excerpts from works in order to discuss them.
Yeah, yeah, we're all outraged at Mico$oft trying to hijack Kerberos, and then trying to censor Slashdot. And remember the Halloween Documents, hmmm? OK, people, enough sitting around, railing at the man and crying in our (free) beer. Time to get off our collective duffs and fight fire with fire.
We want open standards. We have morals, we have egos, we have intelligence enough to know that if we broach an open standard, it'll get squashed, and we loose a measure of the currency that really matters - the repsect of our peers. If we do it on purpose, it's good bye geekdom.
Corporations want to own what they produce. Corporations aren't people, so they don't have morals (except the morality of living up to thier shareholders expectation of bigger profits), don't have egos (of thier own anyway - some may disagree) and only have a collective intelligence dedicated to generating bigger profits. The pursuit of profit is a worthy goal of a corporation, but when they get too zealous, they need to be stepped on - hard. (Duh)
This Kerberos thing is very dangerous, and demonstrates what some companies will do when they put on the blinders to anything but the bottom line. We need a big hammer to squash them flat. A hammer bigger than the DCMA.
Since turn-about is fair play, I propose that the illustrious leaders of Slashdot, Andover and anyone else who wishes to chime in put up a web site dedicated to having Open Internet Standards entrenched in LAW. An anti-DCMA of some sort, that says "You can not say you are Compliant with a Recognized Open Standard if you change anything in that standard one iota - no exceptions. If you do say that you are compliant with a recognized open standard, and are not, you are exempt from the protective provisions of the DCMA, and your Open Standard Compliant product can be reverse engineered/de-compiled/circumvented/hacked/whatev
We as a community are terribly important to our respective governments, our voice does carry weight. They need us for the future. We matter, and therefore so do our opinions. As cheesy as it sounds, we should have electronic petitions, freely viewable on a central site. (Technical details can be worked out later. By people who are far better programmers than I.). We start with the good ol' USA, and every one else in the world will cave in.(BTW, I am Canadian
We don't need to do this under the banner of the FSF, ALCU, or any other organization for that matter. That will invite other people to the party, possibly clouding the issue. We should be focused on only one thing - using the Lawyer's own stick on the backside of anyone who threatens to co-opt Open Standards for thier own ends.
Any takers?
"Depression is merely anger without enthusiasm." - Anonymous
As I understand it, Microsoft called the information in question a trade secret. However, they are now claiming that the text posted to /. is copyrighted. It cannot be both.
First let me congardulate you o nyour innovative reading of copyright laws.
Now lets address your two points:
(1) Slashdot is a common carrier and thus only a conduit. This fails on two counts, at least. First, slashdot DOES edit submitted articles. the submission form says as much. If they do any cutting of submissions at all they are immediately liable for what they chose not to cut.
Secondly, the poster does NOt have the pwoer to remove somethign ocne posted at Slashdot. Only Slashdot management does. Therefor they ARE the point you must attack witha suit to get a copyrighted post removed.
(2) Fair use. A few problems here. First off, to claim fair use you are already admitting infringement. Frankly, thats a legally undebatable point anyway but as people here seem to want to debate it I thought i shoudl mention it.
The second problem is that slashdot is a money making venture. That ad box at the top means they are generating revenue off of posts such as the one in question. It is very hard to argue fair use wher that use is generating a profit.
You brign up journalism, which certainly CAn make a profit, but it is not journalism to reprint a work in its entirety. it is jorunalism to quote a few lines and then, in the majority of the text, analyze it.
In general to my knowledge it has NEVER been held by a court to be fair use to reprint a document in its entirey.
The sad thing is that this was a good diea done badly. Or sloppily. I applaud the idea, but the RIGHT legal thing to do is to re-write the document in your own words and organization. At that point it is YOUR work of authorship. MS though has as much right to control the rules under which their document is replicated as Stahlman has to control his with the GPL.
Unfotunately, but necessarily, the law is equitable.
I think Microsoft wants a legal confrontation... Just as much as Microsoft is a defender of "Inovation" Slashdot is a defender of Linking.
Of all the posts Microsoft asked that Slashdot remove ONE containned the supposid violation.
However Microsoft made thies specs public the liccens itself MUST be bypassed by anyone wishing to view the document with out using Windows (Using unzip for Linux, Mac or Amiga as running the executable isn't an option for non-windows users).
The bulk of the posts to be removed are links to other websites. Had Microsoft contacted the websites linked they would no doupt willingly remove the pages making the Slashdot links void in the first place.
Publishing the specs in whole or in part dose not devalue Microsofts property (sence it is mearly specs for a product and of no value apart from the product) and posting it is fine under normal copyright law.
The base problem with the issue is you will find it nearly imposable to critisise Microsoft if you can never refer to Microsofts copyrights or trademarks.
Windows oh wait umm that Microsoft ohh s** umm That well known operating system sold by a larg company....
How can anyone talk about the specs for a Micosoft product if they can never refer link to or in any way acnoladge the specs?
Thats pritty much what Microsoft is asking. All posts making any attempt to refer back to the specs...
That is using copyrights to silence opposition. Acceptable use prevents this... The DCMA dose not...
When this showed up on.. Technocrat I had to check it out. It also showed up on Kuro5hin.
I of course had to post it on MeowBBS.
This is a major issue...
Can someone liccens your freedoms away?
Microsoft is betting they can... Slashdot is betting they can't.....
I'm taking the paranoid route...
Look for the new MeowPawjects liccens. You may not even THINK about our software with out agreeing to open all your standards....
This will only be attached to future projects.
(It feels like a violation of trust to switch liccenses on people.... I don't want to do that)
I don't actually exist.
I sent a copy of this to billgates@microsoft.com and contact@microsoft.com after attempting to send a letter to the fellow who wrote Andover the nice "Dammit, stop!" letter. That guy sent me a little form letter telling me that his address was for copyright infringement. That caused me to send this:
I have been a long time supporter and consumer of Microsoft and Microsoft's products. I have for the most part been satisfied by the products you've delivered as a company. I am the MS Office guru for my office (the Registration/Information area of the Registrar's office at the University of Florida). I am an amateur Visual Basic developer, and I've even started learning the Win32 API so that I can code some small programs in C++. I have downloaded each new update to Internet Explorer with eager anticipation. I have even defended your freedom to innovate to numerous people.
However, the recent decision by the Microsoft legal department to harass Andover, the publisher of Slashdot.org didn't sit well with me at all. I understand that Microsoft has a responsibility to protect its copyrights and intellectual property, but I also believe that this request is a clear violation of the freedom of speech protected by the Bill of Rights to the US Constitution.
I have already e-mailed the legal department and got a form letter back which explained to me that I had the wrong address.
I have installed Red Hat Linux on my system because I simply cannot stomach dealing with a company who harrasses members of the media. I strongly urge you to cease your actions against Slashdot. There are a lot of users exactly like me who are giving you the benefit of the doubt but who are also getting very tired of watching your large corporation push smaller corporations around.
Please don't think that I'm angry at you personally. I would defend anyone's freedom of speech--even your own. Perhaps this whole thing looks a lot more sinister than it is, but right now it looks as though Microsoft is just upset that someone did something they didn't like. Would Microsoft have harrassed a site who had published sections of your code in order that they might praise it?
Please. Give me a reason not to execute the "rm -r /mnt/c/windows" command. I like so many of your products, but I just can't support a company that tries to bully public opinion by shutting up the voices of dissenters.
"The further I get from the things that I care about, the less I care about how much further away I get." -Robert Smith
Now that the cat is out of the bag, I believe the best way to move forward on this is to release a new spec. Read on...
c at-kerberos-revisions-05.txt c at-kerberos-pk-init-11.txt
n t,extra_sids,
MS W2K Kerbos V5 Authorization Fields
1.0 PREAMBLE - READ THIS NOW
This document is a compilation of information posted publicly on the
internet. The author has not entered into any agreement with Microsoft
regarding non-disclosure of this specification, nor bypassed any copyright
protections, nor reverse-engineered the protocol.
1.1 INTENT
The author intends for this document to assist in the reverse-engineering
of the protocol by describing the fields necessary to interoperate between
UNIX and W2K server implementations of the Kerbos V5 specification. The
author will not maintain this document, therefore it is requested that the
relevent interested parties host, maintain, and correct this document as
reference for future work, without being tainted by the MS EULA.
1.2 LICENSE
This document is licensed under the GNU Public License. See www.gnu.org
for details.
1.3 FURTHER READING
http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-ietf-
http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-ietf-
1.4 REPRESENTATION
All symbolic names have been changed. The data representation has been
changed. Any derived work will not violate MS copyright in this regard.
1.5 PREREQUISTES
Reader should have knowledge of MS API, particularly FILETIME, UNICODE,
and SIDs. Reader should be familiar with NDR encoding and the Kerbos V5
specification.
2.0 SPECIFICATION
Microsoft has produced an extension to the Kerbos spec called PAC
(Privilege Attribute Certificate) which includes proprietary information
in the ticket authorization field, specifically the IF-RELEVANT field
with a sub-identifier of 128.
2.0.1 FORMAT
All data is in low endian format. Most data is in NDR format, a stream-
based serialization of structures and arrays. Sometimes this data is
encrypted. There are not many keys to deal with so some experimentation
should yield good results.
2.1 PAC STRUCTURE
DWORD toc_count ; number of items in the TOC (table of
; contents)
DWORD pac_version ; version number for this specification,
; currently 0
TOCITEM toc_items[toc_count] ; array of TOC items
BYTE raw_data[...] ; raw data corresponding to items in TOC,
; all items are aligned to 8 bytes
2.1.1 TOCITEM
DWORD item_type ; the type of the item in the data portion
DWORD item_length ; the number of bytes in the item
QWORD item_offset ; 64bit offset from the beginning of the PAC
; structure to the raw data corresponding to
; this item. least significant three bits
; MUST BE ZERO. isn't this a bit large for
; network traffic?
item_type may be one the following values:
item_login = 1 ; item contains client credentials (2.2)
item_supplemental = 2 ; item contains supplemental credentials (2.3)
item_server_sig = 6 ; item contains server signature (2.4)
item_kdc_sig = 7 ; item contains kdc signature (2.4)
item_user_name = 10 ; item contains the username (2.5)
2.2 LOGIN information (NDR encoded)
TIMESTAMP login_time ; last login time
TIMESTAMP expire_time ; session expiration time or TIME_NA if n/a
TIMESTAMP forced_time ; forced session expiration time or TIME_NA
; if n/a
TIMESTAMP passwd_mtime ; last password modification time or 0 if not
; set
TIMESTAMP passwd_min_time; time afterwhich password may be changed
TIMESTAMP passwd_max_time; time afterwhich password must be changed or
; TIME_NA
USTRING username ; (optional) the W2K user name
USTRING userdesc ; (optional) the W2K descriptive user name
USTRING script_path ; (optional) the user login script path
USTRING profile_path ; (optional) the user profile path
USTRING homedir_path ; (optional) the user home directory
USTRING homedir_drv ; (optional) the user home directory drive
; mapping in the event of a UNC home directory
WORD session_cnt ; (ignore) the number of sessions the user
; currently maintains
WORD badpasswd_cnt ; number of bad authentication attempts since
; last successful authentication
DWORD uid ; relative user id
DWORD gid ; relative primary group id
DWORD gid_cnt ; number of additional groups
GIDATTRIB moregids[gid_cnt] ; array of relative gids and attributes
DWORD flags ; determines the validity of the following
; fields: 0x0020= extra_sid* info is present,
; 0x0200= resgrp* info is present
DWORD ignore1[4] ; (ignore)
USTRING nb_server ; netbios name for KDC that requested AS
USTRING nb_domain ; netbios name for user's domain
SID sid_domain ; sid for user's domain, base for relative ids
DWORD ignore2[2] ; (ignore)
DWORD userflags ; tons of flags (see uf_* below)
DWORD ignore3[7] ; (ignore)
DWORD extra_sid_cnt ; number of sids to follow, see flags
SIDATTRIB extra_sids[extra_sid_cnt] ; more sids, see flags
SID resgrp_sid_domain ; sid for resource domain, base for relative
; ids below
DWORD resgrp_gid_cnt ; number of groups to follow, see flags
GIDATTRIB resgrp_gids[resgrp_sid_cnt] ; more relative gids and
; attributes, see flags
2.2.1 TIMESTAMP
QWORD time ; 64 bit value of 100nsec increments from
; 1601-01-01 GMT epoch
TIME_NA = 0x7FFFFFFFFFFFFFFF
2.2.2 USTRING
WORD size ; number of bytes in the unicode string,
; length is size/2
WORD max ; number of bytes in the buffer
WORD buf[max/2] ; array of unicode characters
2.2.3 GIDATTRIB
DWORD id ; relative id
DWORD attrib ; attributes (0x1=required,
; 0x2=enabled_by_default, 0x4=enabled)
2.2.4 SID
BYTE version ; version number
BYTE agent_cnt ; number of authorizing agents, max 15
SIDPREFIX prefix ; the sid prefix
DWORD agent[agent_cnt] ; array of authorizing agents
2.2.5 SIDPREFIX
BYTE b[6] ; array of six bytes, presumably
; S-5-a-b-c-d SID prefix
BTW, NT authority's SID is 0,0,0,0,0,5; note the unusual byte order
2.2.6 SIDATTRIB
SID sid ; sid
DWORD attrib ; attributes (0x1=required,
; 0x2=enabled_by_default, 0x4=enabled)
2.2.7 userflag VALUES
uf_disabled = 0x00001 ; account disabled
uf_directory = 0x00002 ; home directory is required
uf_nopasswd = 0x00004 ; password not necessary
uf_tmpdup = 0x00008 ; account is a temporary duplicate
uf_normal = 0x00010 ; normal account
uf_mnslogin = 0x00020 ; mns login account
uf_domaintrust = 0x00040 ; domain-wide trust account
uf_hosttrust = 0x00080 ; host-wide trust account
uf_servertrust = 0x00100 ; server-wide trust account
uf_noexpire = 0x00200 ; password does not expire
uf_autolock = 0x00400 ; account is autolocked
uf_encrypt = 0x00800 ; encrypted password is valid
uf_smartcard = 0x01000 ; smartcard is required
uf_delegate = 0x02000 ; delegate trust account
uf_notdelegated = 0x04000 ; not currently delegated
uf_desonly = 0x08000 ; only des key is valid
uf_nopreauth = 0x10000 ; do not require pre-authentication
2.2.8 NT TOKEN - is apparently generated from the following fields
uid,gid_cnt,moregids,flags,sid_domain,extra_sid_c
resgrp_gid_cnt,resgrp_sid_domain,resgrp_gids
2.3 SUPPLEMENTAL - additional information may be sent by the KDC
depending on the security package, but this only pertains to PKINIT
packets. I good deal of encryption goes on here as well. The data
itself is encrypted with the client key, but also appears to be NDR
encoded and encrypted with the KDC->client key as well. Some
experimentation should resolve this once and for all. Be wary that
multiple levels of NDR encoding may be present.
2.3.1 SUPPLEMENTAL HEADER (NDR encoded and encrypted with KDC->client
key)
DWORD crypt_ver ; version number of key if encrypted,
; 0 otherwise
DWORD crypt_type ; type of cryptography (see Kerbos types)
BYTE raw[...] ; the raw data is an NDR encoded CREDARRAY
; below (size in TOC entry)
2.3.2 CREDARRAY (NDR encoded)
DWORD cnt ; number of credentials
CREDS creds[cnt] ; credentials (NDR encoded again)
2.3.3 CREDS (NDR encoded)
USTRING pckg_name ; name of package
DWORD size ; number of bytes in opaque data
BYTE opaque[size] ; array of bytes comprising opaque data
2.4 SIGNATURES
DWORD sig_type ; type of signature (keyed checksum only)
BYTE sig[...] ; raw signature data (size in TOC entry)
FYI: signing of PAC is performed as follows:
1. PAC is generated with both signatures zeroed out
2. Signature is run on PAC with server key and stored in server
entry
3. Signature is run on PAC with KDC key and stored in KDC entry
2.5 USER NAME - helps resolve that the PAC applies to the correct user
TIMESTAMP timestamp ; ticket AuthTime field in timestamp format
WORD size ; size of username in bytes, length is size/2
WORD name[size] ; array of unicode characters comprising
; username delimited with / and @, NOT
; TERMINATED
2.6 REQUEST PREAUTH DATA - PACS occur in conjuction with AS and
TGS requests, but they can be requested on demand or suppressed
with a PAC-REQUEST. The format is a mere BOOLEAN value. If the
PAC is not present and the value is true, it is included. If the
PAC is present and the value is false, it is omitted. The ID for
this request is called KRB5_PADATA_PAC_REQUEST and has a value of
128.
I read with interest your editorial about MS. I, too, seethe with anger at the thought that the 'big corporations' are wrestling with the 'little guys' for control over the internet. How? Wow, there is just so much at stake. A small example: MSN. They are now promoting music on their front page a la MP3.com (I am a little ignorant about MPPP, but am a Napster devotee); they are ready to rapidly fill in the vacuum left by the demise of Napster (maybe?) and MP3 (certainly) with crappy songs selected by god-knows-who. Here is what bothers me: anytime someone comes up with a way to use the internet as God (or the military, whatever) intended, i.e., Gnutella / Napster, etc... lawsuits fly. This is because those entrenched at the top are threatened, as well they should be. We, the People, are trying to create a New Economy, while they, The Entrenched are vigorously fighting it. Can the battle be won? I saw a guy on Charlie Rose (name? heh, sorry...) who said "The Whales are getting bigger, but the Minnows are getting stronger." I hope the minnows survive. There is nothing less at stake here than our own autonomy, our Freedom. there is nothing less at stake here than mind control, and behavioral modification. ...and billions upon billions of dollars, some of which some of us have enough of - the same people who will never have enough total freedom of thought, of action, of discourse, of choice... Bluesee
SDMI: Finally! Music that won't rip or burn! Brought to you by the fine folks at RIAA.
i have read and read many of the comments posted in all the articles. I think someone needs a summary.
most people are in agreement that the posting of the spec in full was illegal. but who cares. we are not lawyers. we have no right to judge what is or what is not legal.
if slashdot claims responsibily for the comment by willingly removing it, they have claimed responsibilty for all comments. BUT, if a court orders them to remove this one comment, the court takes all responsibilty.
i would rather the court stay out of it as much as the next guy, but we didn't bring the court in to this. now that they are here, we must play by those rules.
if microsoft doesn't want a comment here, let them use a court to remove it. let them sue the poster if they like (assuming illegal activity was conducted), but slashdot is NOT responsible.
whether slashdot wins or looses this battle does not matter. as i have read, most of us would rather it not be there as well. whether we win the war matters.
Not only that but since microsoft is not able to spread fud they are using DDos attacks to bring down a site that is frequently critical of them and their products.
Well maybe not but I think it's only a matter of time before contries and companies are using cracking and Dos attacks to disrupt enemies and competitors.
Environmentalists are their own worst enemy. ~tricklenews.com
this is great! does it work? i.e. are you sure this will authenticate access to W2K desktops if I login to a unix terminal using kerberos?
No, Thursday's out. How about never - is never good for you?
Im posting as an AC due to the fact that my password *still* hasnt arrived for the new account I created some 24 hours ago...
The solution is simple:Pack up the boxen and move them to either:
- Canada
- Australia or
- Russia
There aint no DMCA in any of those places.Think about it : What are lawyers for ? What are laws for ?
... Except the place maybe. Slasdhot ... damn! What would I do for a day if I couldn't read /. ?
...
You have two laws contradicting each others. First, the copyright law. Second, the Free Speech law.
What's new in there ? Nothing
Just a though
Looking for a great online backup: Green Backup
I think given Microsoft's efforts to break the Kerbeos standard is the last straw, and the company should be broken up, forced to release thier broken-arse source code.
People forget, however, that most of the people who work at Microsoft are behind the times and still think that they are the good guys. I think that a protest would indicate how the DoJ, the Judge, the States, and most of the rest of the world feel about them.
So, Commander Taco, when do you want your traffic deadlock at Redmond?
Maybe the state's highest function is to grind out insoluble problems. (Zelazny, Hall of Mirrors)
Hmm...nice to have you aboard. Apparently you are new here however. I think there is general concensus here and on the Internet in general that Microsoft has "innovated" exactly two things:
... its all good!
1. the dancing Paperclip
2. the squiggly underline
This has been debated over and over, and like it or not, its the truth. If you know of any others, please bring them forth (but they will be shot down as either a ripoff of someone elses work, or aquired by means of a buyout.) On a personal note, I come from much the same background as yourself. Worked with Microsoft products since DOS 3.x and on thru Windows 3.0, 3.1, Windows 95, NT, and on and on. Created applications with C++, VB, Access, SQL Server, etc etc.
Fortunately for me however, I gave Linux a serious look one day and started using it for everything I did. Back then that was quite an undertaking considing there were far fewer applications to choose from. But you know what? That was the best decision I ever made! Next to Windows, Linux is _pure_ bliss. No crashing, no silly shareware click-thru's, no assinine registry, no need for WaReZ (can you honestly say that about Windows? really?)
So, without a doubt, please give Linux a try if you haven't already. And be prepared to be blown away!
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
...unless you want to argue that the DMCA violates the First Amendment. In that case, the article should have made that point.
I thought emmett's editorial was very good, regaurdless of the fact that it didn't address Microsoft's specific copyright claims.
I've heard some people say things like "well, the people who wrote the constitution wrote the section about copyrights first", implying that it is more important. The fact of the matter is, that if we can't express our opinoins freely, then forget about copyrights. Business is not more important than freedom. I thought emmett was very clear that the DMCA, (and therefore Mircosoft's case) are unconstitutional. It's a principle thing. Congress shall make no law.
Kick the wrong ass, and it'll turn around and bite you (a.g. Baalam's donkey).
Hosting copyrighted material is ILLEGAL, you must ditch posts that actually contain it, regardless of free-speech issues. Fight the copyright issue using legal means, and if you win then by all means replace the postings. Getting yourself totally shut down (martyred) is the ultimate loss of speech freedom.
Linking is a different matter; MS should be contacting the linked-to sites.
Yes, posters own their posted material. Or do they? Since material posted by SlashDot users appeared in a certain book, you may have shown that they don't. Hoist by your own petard.
Also, Anonymous Coward is by definition "nobody." Since nobody made the posting, nobody owns the contents - the ownership must devolve back onto SlashDot.
It would be out of character for the SlashDot team to do anything for purely commercial reasons, but I bet you need your new server to deal with the hits that this controversy is generating.
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
I've been standing on the sidelines here through the DMCA passage and through the DVD fiasco, but attacking Slashdot directly? That's an attack on where I live!
/. needs money, people to show up in court in ties, or someone to lob malotov cocktails, just tell me where you want me.
So if
This has me nail-spittin' mad.
"Reactionaries must be deprived of the right to voice their opinions; only the people have that right." - Mao
Not to nitpick, but RCF should be "Request For Comments", or "RFC".
Hope this helps
"Reactionaries must be deprived of the right to voice their opinions; only the people have that right." - Mao
From what I can see, media coverage of this issue is an important defence for Slashdot, and could help influence politicians and others ultimately involved in the case. I noticed the NY Times article wrote about the 1000 comments for the first story, obviously this was something that caught their attention.
What I believe we need is some sort of "guest book" or online petition where all of Slashdot's supporters can identify themselves, to "stand up and be counted". The summaries of this database, broken down by geographical area (including country), could then be released to the general media. I think the results would really surprise the people who aren't aware of just how popular Slashdot really is!
Obviously, this would need to be a serious effort. We would need to collect enough identifying information about each person to be able effectively analyse the contributions, and to establish the credibility of each person who signs. Without, of course, permitting the possibility of the database falling into the hands of spammers or other undesirables.
The site that this log is hosted on would have to able to withstand a lot of traffic. The software would have to be put in place quickly, and someone would need to be responsible for summarising the entries and releasing them to the mainstream media.
Who can help us with this?
And, while I'm posting, congratulations Slashdot for your important contribution to the freedom of speech.
Paul D. Cull
pcull@pce.dont.even.think.about.spamming.me.org
maybe you don't understand this concept, but that was what is called a JOKE! lighten up a bit.
Your analogy is bad, because the air has no control over what sound it transmit, no will of its own. Thus, it cannot be sued anymore than the ocean. If you can't understand that difference, then I seriously pity you.
It's not entirely bad. If I call everyone I know on the phone in a giant conference call and read them the Microsoft document in question, MS cannot sue the phone company. If I call my friends one at a time to do the same, MS cannot get an injunction against Ma Bell completing my calls nor can they sue.
They cannot even sue Ma Bell if I leave my reading as a message for my friends. They cannot make Bell take the messages out of their voicemail system.
MS's only recourse is to sue me personally. If I called from a payphone and didn't leave my name, they'll just have to hire a detective and hope they can figure out who that was speaking with the altered voice. That's the way it works.
Slashdot must remove a posting that is illegal ( copyright violation ) if it has the technical ability to do so.
but
1) slashdot should decline to decide what constitutes copyright violation, let MS ask get an injunction.
2) slashdot should certainly refuse to agree to the licence for the sole purpose of determining whether a violation occured.
3) slashdot should officially inform the DOJ and the judge in the antitrust case.
-- look, cheese ahoy!
1) Take down the kerberos posts
2) Tell MS to go fly a kite
3) Hemos RULZ
The article yesterday was intentionally worded to spark a fire and it worked. Those that read the article only and not the actual letter from MS are the ones that are the most angry. I was angry when I read the article. THEN I READ THE LETTER.
MS is not asking that you remove reader's comments, it is asking that you remove copyrighted material. It is not an issue about freedom of speech or trade secrets, it is about copyright.
It does not matter that they allowed people to download it. Millions of people purchase books, but that doesn't change the copyright.
There is a lot of emotional ranting going on about this topic, but there seems to be little logical thinking. It is a simple solution, just remove the copyrighted material and leave the comments. The comments are protected by free speech, but verbatim copying of a copyrighted document is infringement.
It is sad to see that /. is resorting to the same tactics that mainstream media uses to get readership...twist the truth enough to make it an emotional issue and let's forget all the facts.
--LT
But thats not how the world is. We've built these things called copyright laws that make keeping secrets the state's business instead of the companies' or individuals that profit from them.
This in my opinion in a fundamental mistake because it invariably creates the conflict: protect free speech or police a business secret?
...................
...................
...................
but couldn't the spec be seen a "chapter" of W2K? (the chapter on how to block out OSS competitors, check the Halloween docs where they discussed this course of action)
--
+&x
How is it that after all these years, starting with Borg's first attempt back in the mid-1970s at locking up open-source software via licensing that people are still trying to do deals with his company? Would it have anything to do with greed and the desire to succeed vicariously the way Borg did when he signed a nondisclosure agreement with Big Blue way back when? Did you really think in your wildest dreams that there somehow would be an exception in your case? Now you're saying, "oh, he's done it again! He's pulled the football right out from under our feet." How many more times will it take before people wake up to the way things are done in Redmond? When Borg walks up to you and says, "show me yours and I'll show you mine," are you going to tell him to piss off? Probably not. There are too many dollars at stake. Right?
BTW, the DMCA has no teeth in the matter at hand and Borg knows that. If it did, why would he insist on a nondisclosure agreement? He might have simply pointed to protection under copyright law.
I think it is high time the computer industry grow up and undermine all the witchcraft sorcery and magic code spells.
Programming is the act of automating, perhaps dynamically, computer based actions. Yet automating the act of codeing is to complex?
I don't think so! In fact I know better! http://www.mindspring.com/~timrue/KNMVIC.html (easier than posting the USPTO link)
What does this have to do with this issue and MS?
Plenty! So long as the witchcraft is being practiced, you will have these childish problems.
In fact it seesm that MS has done nothing you increase it's own everything intent, under the cover of a court case that suggest such actions would be the last thing they would do.
3 S.E.A.S - Virtual Interaction Configuration (VIC) - VISION OF VISIONS!
And you must be that lawyer ? Great, write up a class action suite aginst MSFT for the nonrefund issue. I am sure that you kind find all kinds of documentation about it on the web. I would be most happy to sign up.
Damn, I love the way you write. Well put, and clear in vision. You ought to write more, I always enjoy your stuff.
I have no knowledge of slashdot ever censoring anything in any way, and I'd like it to remain that way, so I'd be confounded if slashdot were to simply comply with this.
---
script-fu: hash bang slash bin bash
[ approaching AI ]
Innovation is not a ground-breaking thing. That's invention.
Innovation is fulfilling a market need. I.e. it is filling in an opportunity. It make bring an invention to the masses, but it rarely is actually "bright idea" invention.
Linux is an innovation. It doesn't invent anything new, but it does fill needs, and it brings UNIX to the masses.
Innovation is important because it is not hard to do and yet is immensely beneficial. Most people can't be genius inventors, but they CAN be innovators.
Has Microsoft innovated in the past? Yes. Have they lately? In some ways. IE 5 was extremely innovative because it provided developers TREMENDOUS support for doing web work beyond simple HTML. The support for XML, DOM, XSL, etc. are well appreciated by developers and have lead to lots of people flocking away from Netscape. Mozilla, otoh, is being innovative too in its own way, however we have to wait until final release to determine if it is more innovative than Microsoft has been.
Was Microsoft innovative in tying the browser to the OS? Yup.
Was Microsoft innovative with turning COM from a way of embedding spreadsheets in word documents into a multi-tier transactional component model? You bet.
I think we have a lot of double standards in this community. For every little thing Linux does, we lavish praise. However, we convieniently ignore the little things that Microsoft does to fill their own market's needs.
Microsoft can make crappy software. They also have abused their monopoly position. And, no, they haven't had any ground-breaking innovations in a while. But they DO innovate.
-Stu
Here's a link to the document... http://www.thetop.net/kerbos/spec.txt -Hope
I know others have made this point, but I have something so say about this.
"Your analogy is bad, because the air has no control over what sound it transmit, no will of its own. Thus, it cannot be sued anymore than the ocean. If you can't understand that difference, then I seriously pity you."
Exactly the point I was trying to make. The air has no control over what sound it transmits and Slashdot and Andover have no control over what is posted. It's that simple. Even if Slashdot removes the posts, it won't change the fact that they were posted. What you are suggesting is that Slashdot can prevent someont from posting news based on the content. If that were true, we wouldn't even be having this conversation, I'm sure.
So, as you can see, my analogy does work. Slashdot == Air.
Bad Mojo
Bad Mojo
"If you can't win by reason, go for volume." -- Calvin
Consider how TCP/IP would have fared if it had been GPLed from the start. Commercial OSes would have shunned it in favour of proprietary or other "open" protocols such as OSI.
However something along the lines of the LGPL, allowing inclusion within commercial software, should not pose such a problem.
Yeah, that MP sketch came to mind when I decided to change the post from three things to four things. Apparently I missed one instance of three. Gee, I wish that this browser edit control had a vi emulation mode. As it is, I'm in the habit of hitting Esc when I finish a thought and in this lousy browesr, Esc clears the edit control. =:^O
new To_Do_List_Item = "code up a vi-compatible edit control for Mozilla"
Anomalous: inconsistent with or deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected
Anomalous: deviating from what is usual, normal, or expected
Canard: a false or unfounded repor
And here it is in HTML...
Microsoft Kerbos V5 Authentication Specification in HTML
-Hope
If there are, I haven't found 1 of the 64,000 yet. The original comment was referencing the fact that there were 64000 published bugs in DOS2000. That's right... that is how many bugs Micros~1 themselves openly admit to having. The fact that you have not used your computer enough to run into them does not detract from the point.
In fairness to M$, they were mostly very minor problems, and this is basically an 1.0 software release (or 6.0, depending on how you look at it). Once they get their first service pack out, I'm sure many of these problems will be addressed.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
There's such a thing as "common carrier status". Without it, phone companies could be held liable for the content of phone calls, for example. The moment Slashdot demonstrates the ability to selectively strike individual posts on the basis of content, they lose that status.
...possibly also Quaker Oats, as their brand has been mentioned by name in at least a couple of pretty nasty grits posts ]
Keep in mind that this is the age of frivolous lawsuits, my friend. If Slashdot wanted to survive, they'd have to act proactively, and strike any content that could expose them to litigation (hint: this is precisely what moderated forums [e.g. ZDNet online] do).
Better hope they could manage the workload, too, then... a couple major lawsuits would probably wipe them out.
[ Oh, and if you can't think of anyone who might want to sue Slashdot, Natalie Portman and Microsoft come to mind... ]
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Do you get the picture now?
DNA just wants to be free...