Slashdot Mirror
Slashback: Mud, Expansion, Patentability
More information to slip anonymously under Big Boss' door. digitaleopard writes: "Hey, the last posted story doesn't tell the whole scoop on the NWFusion articles. They are actually a group of stories in their 'technology Insider' banner, including pieces on the new enterprise level features in the latest kernels and their testing of these versions The main link page for all the stories is here."
Clearer thinking requires MUDdy vision. Sony / Verant may not like you to use servers other than the ones they provide for their multi-user games. Not everyone feels that way, so you can choose if you'd like to use a Free game in the first place. captaint writes: "The Open Source Graphical MUD Dusk has just gone into version 1.5. For those who haven't seen it yet, which should be just about everyone, it's just what it says it is. It's a fully functional OS G-MUD, which is open to anyone who wants to play, contribute, or start their own world."
In the 15 countries which have signed the Schengen agreement. An informant too shy to be named writes:"I saw a story on Slashdot about electronic ID cards in Hong Kong, so I wanted to let you know (if you didn't know yet) that there are already electronic ID cards in use in Finland. I don't yet know much about what you can do with one, but the official page explains: official page explains.=)"
And yes, it's short, but in English;)
Anyone else addicted to "Aztec" as a child? OK, ok, so a VIC20 as a WAP browser is of limited usefulness. These guys have some more important, utilitarian things to do, like ... browse the Web on a C64.
Gaelyne writes: "A story about the WAVE was posted at heise online earlier this year, but since then the software has had it's first public release and is Open Source - a direct result of the author having been influenced by Linux and other open source projects. Screen shots of the Web browser are also available."
And never one to give up hope, an unnamed correspondent writes:"Further to the news that Wine runs Excel and Word 2000, I'd like to report that OS/2 can run Photoshop 5.0. Seen here at http://os2.ru/soft/odin/gallery.phtml are the screenshots of the some of the programs that OS/2 now runs with Odin, the Win32 binary 'converter'. Functionality and reliability of Photoshop will increase as work continues. Odin has really begun to move forward in recent months, with the number of apps you can run increasing as more of the Wine code is brought in. Other apps such as Lotus Notes and RealPlayer 7 having been working for ages..."
Your host this evening will be Mr. Alan Cox. Paul Maragakis writes: "The European Commission has launched consultations via the Internet on the patentability of computer-implemented inventions. As is mentioned in this announcement, enterprises favouring the "open source community" have raised concerns about software patents. You can all contribute until December 15 to help them reach a rational decision on what and why software concepts should or should not be patentable."
Someone is laughing all the way to the bank ... An anonymous reader writes: "http://www.paperclick.com/press/oct1900.htm Digital Convergence has agreed to pay NeoMedia $100 million (including $8 million in cash the first year) to license their patent, which basically covers using a printed ID to link back to content on the Web (sounds suspiciously like using a printed URL to reference a Web page, but oh well)."
This being a press-release, the tone is downright cheery, and this is described as a "win=win" situation for all involved. Can you imagine the boardroom conversations this must have inspired, though? "Y'know, Bob, I think it would be a real win to pay another company one hundred million dollars, don't you?" "You're right, Pete -- that sounds great to me."
They ARE actually using smartcards to access both public and private services in Finland.
The electronic identification card is safe to use because it is based on high-security, microchip technology. (Just like Tickle-Me and Country Elmo!) As with other smart cards, every cardholder has a Personal Identification Number (PIN). In the event that the card is lost or that unauthorized access to the PIN codes is gained, there is a round-the-clock revocation service that revokes the card immediately.
The electronic identification card must be handled and protected just like other similar cards or documents, such as credit cards, driving licences, or passports. PINs should never be kept in the same place as the electronic ID card. The card and the related PIN may only be used by the holder to whom the card is issued.
If the card is lost or obtained by a third party, or if the PIN comes to the attention of such party, this must immediately be reported to the certificate revocation list on 0800-162 622. For hearing-impaired people, a text telephone service is available on 0100-2288. The cardholder's responsibility for the card ceases when the card is reported as lost or stolen and the card is entered in the certificate revocation list.
How to fuck a Finnish smartcard holder in 3 easy steps:
1) Kidnap them and beat the pincode out of them.
2) Use their credentials to transfer the contents of their bank account to somewhere in Switzerland. Bank of Bermuda is also good for this.
3) Let them go.
They then report the card stolen, but it's too late, everything that happened is their responsibility.
I don't even have to go into the nightmare of employers and governments both having executeable access to the chip on your smartcard... tracking viruses for fired employees, using the shared credentials to track web sites used by employees in their personal time.... making "citizenship" and smartcard ownership the same, requiring citizenship/smartcard to buy food, denying citizenship/smartcard to political dissidents...
dear god. got to go take some soma.
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What happens when you outlaw guns
Most of you are probably sitting there snickering at the idea of a C64/128 web browser. Let me clue you in :)
:) A 20 Mhz C64 is comparable to a pentium 100 Id reckon, considering that usually you are bashing the chips directly on a c64 :) :)
:)
:) I think that the c64 is a perfect machine for a kid. I remember first using one and instantly wanting to know what made it tick. The c64 is the reason Im in IT today. However, today's kids are taught on high-end PCs, and just want to know where to double-click to play quake...
WAVE wasnt the first, I believe FairligHTML was, but didnt support frames etc. FYI, people still connect to the net with a c64, it's not hard to do. Most of you will remember a beige box with a clunky 1541 hanging off the side (or even just a tape drive if you're british). But the C64 has come a long way baby, and you can expand the system up all the way, to the point where:
it runs at 20Mhz (SuperCPU). Doesnt sound like much, but remember that the 6502 (6510 or 16 bit variants used in the supercpus) are like RISC chips, they dont do much but they do it real fast!
You can have upwards of 16M of RAM. True this is normally used as a RAMDrive and is not immediately addressable, but hot-damn it's quick.
Gigs of Harddrive space (CMD Stuff) - Dunno WHY you would ever want a gig considering the programs are usually no more than about 170k in entirety, but you can do it
FD-2000 and variants - high speed 3.5" floppies which are 1.72M (from memory?). These things are also very cool...
Connecting to the net is simple, just grab a swiftlink and suddenly you can use your new superfast modem. Grab Novaterm and jump on in character mode, or maybe try ACE or LUNIX (working from memory here) if you need PPP...
Basically you can expand a c64 to your heart's content, if you are so inclined. People still use C64s daily. There are still games and demos published for it.
Why would anyone use a c64 when you can get a PC for chips? People are attracted to the c64 due to its simplicity... It does what it does and it does it well. There arent continuous layers of software between you and the hardware. It boots up in under a second. Its fun. The hardware is full of exploitable bugs which are fun to exploit (demo makers have a great time doing this). And last, but no least, it is CHEAP. You can pick up a c64 for nothing. Games are nothing (or very cheap). The games are some of the best ever, and thank god for that because if I had to live in a world full of UT and Quake3's I would go mad!
I truly believe that a course in c64 assembler should be a prerequisite for comp sci degrees. NOTHING teaches you tight coding than making a 1Mhz 8 bit chip jump thru hoops (and boy, do some of the demo coders like CREST make it jump thru hoops, their demos are worth the bother of setting up an old c64 alone).
I think there is still a place for this technology. Apart from Eastern Block countries (not everyone has millions of dollars and live in a geek compound
Quite sad really.... I miss the thrill of the old days... The c64 in its heyday was like the linux crowd on speed, it was simply *the* most exciting time in computing ever...
Simon
Simon
The real linux_penguin has Slashdot ID 101961. Anyone else is an impostor. Including Bruce Perens.
FROM: romco@virtualpn.com
TO: Digital:Convergence
ATT: IP Department
Dear Sir(s),
Congradulations on your agreement with NeoMedia Technologies. Now that you have right to use PaperClick(TM). I want to make you aware of another opportunity your company will be interested in.
VirtualPaperClick(TM)
Our technology allows your clients to have the paper and virtual world become one.
Here is how it works:
Magazines are shipped with our patented CircularDatabase(TM). A customer simply inserts the CircularDatabase(TM) into a Windows* computer and like magic your catalog is automaticly displayed with our patented VirtualPaperClick(TM) technology. Your Virtual catalog looks nearly identical to your paper only better. The text is automaticly formated to the computer screen and our VirtualPaperClick(TM)allows your customer easy 2Clik:Shopping(TM).
We would like to offer you an exclusive contract to use our IP for only $10,000,000.
-Romco
CEO vitualpn.com
*note: Our products are only licenced for use on Microsoft Windows computers. After though testing we found that Mac users just stare at the shiny (un-Branded) side of the CircularDatabase(TM) while 'nix users can't stop laughing.
AdFuel
Has anyone seen DigitalConvergence's cuecat commercials? Well, it cant be called a commercial, more like an infomercial, or a "brainwashing program." One of the parts that makes me just laugh is where the dumb guy can't believe that the cuecat will replace all the pieces of paper he has around his computer with web address on it! Okay, what sort of a moron keeps urls on paper?!? who need bookmarks when you have paper! "now you can stop recording your urls on paper and use the cuecat to access your sites..."
Now, for the real shit about the cuecat that just pisses me off (besides a certain person who works at DC) lets say, i want to look up information on quantum theory? what do i do? let me guess, do i use the cue cat to scan a light particle that has a barcod eon it? i think not. This thing is so fucking useless that its not even funny. over 90% of the time that anyone i know is lokking for information on the internet, they are not looking for a single product specific thing (not including drivers/manuals/software for hardware). I mean, why would you want to go to pepsi's web site? The only valid uses i can see for cue cats, is in magazines and newspaper. Why? so that you can access information about the person who wrote the article, to see what else they have written, or for a digital copy of the article, or even for other articles from past issues relating to this article. sort of like an embeded hyperlink system for printed media. In books it would be cool also if author is discussing a topic and wants to provide references to online information.
Its spelt "L-I-N-U-X", but pronunced as "Free Beer"
Here's my conspiracy theory:
Sounds like that suing relationship may even be done on purpose. Sound crazy? Note that DC gave it up so easily without even a fight and shelled out massive amounts of money for the right to use this "invention?"
This sounds suspiciously like a partner strategy designed for bullying up on competitors. Another company that has bought the patent rights sues DC. No problem, they have friendly talks and work out a win-win situation. You see, DC has been having some problems with giving away its scanner and it being put to other uses. NeoMedia, may find DC a willing partner and help out for a modest fee of $100,000,000 that includes all legal expenses. NeoMedia will now be the legal agressor and go after all the "unauthorized" uses of cuecats in the privacy of people's homes. NeoMedia has to protect its new patent, you know! NeoMedia wins, DC wins.
But that's not all. If and when a case ever does make it to court over those stupid cuecats, DC can claim they have paid $100,000,000 for the right to use this technology and they are fighting a "thief" who is stealing that large sum of money by using a the very useful XOR 8-bit flipping instruction on the CPU to decode. This puts $100,000,000 worth of pressure on the judge to break the arms and legs of any freedom the victim may have. So much for living in a free country, eh?
This conspiracy theory was brought to you free of charge. Distribute and mangle freely.
Instead of taking it out on the slashdot accepted enemy DC, why aren't we enraged by a patent that is unbelievably obvious.
"We" are, or at least I am. However, I think the community is at least as outraged by corporate idiots who help make such reprehensible patents profitable by paying $100M to license such obvious notions.
Amen.
[begin rant]
And, with any luck, another nail in the coffin for patents. It is generations past time to scrap the entire patent system and close the patent office. Patents have never served to promote progress, indeed, they have only served to slow it down.
Consider for a moment: when a new (even non-obvious invention) comes along, there is almost always a footrace between multiple inventors to the patent office, with the winner gaining exclusive rights and the losers (who also invented the device) out in the cold. Why is this? Because nearly every invention builds upon a mountain of public knowledge, and an invention "whose time has come" will occur to several independent minds at about the same time.
So what do we do? We stiff several inventors to disproportionately reward one. The irony is that it isn't even necessary -- individuals and companies were inventive before the patent system was created and will remain so after it goes away. Why? Because, as the free market shows us in every other arena, a monopoly isn't required to be profitable, or even to recoup development costs.
We all assume we'll continue to have exponential growth in knowledge and technology we've grown accustomed to, particularly in the high tech computer industry. This would be true, except that with 20 year monopolies being granted on even the most trivial and obvious ideas, the exponent in question has been reduced from "greater than one" to "nearly equal to one."
This may serve the purposes of the entrenched industries and governments, who can't abide new technologies until they figure out how to dominate and control them and are desperate to slow progress down by any means, but it is a disservice to the rest of mankind.
As was said by the European representative at ICANN, intellectual property is nothing more than theft from the public domain. Nowhere is this more true than with patents.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
I'm taking bets on how long digital convergence stays in business. I doubt they make to the end of the year. They paid $100 MILLION for the rights to print a bar code, which most companies have been doing free for years. What kind of idiots are these people?
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Username taken, please choose another one.
Revar decided to GPL Fuzzball 6 and put it up on SourceForge: https://sourceforge.net/projects/fbmuck/
Fuzzball is a variant of TinyMUCK that, among other things, hosts FurryMUCK's 8000+ registered users (though FurryMUCK is still using version 5.x).
I can't figure out which makes me laugh harder, the fact that someone paid $100 to print an ugly URL code on paper/objects/whatnot or the basic idea of paperclick in general.
;) and thus bypassing paperclick's claim altogether.
;)
I don't get this. At the moment, you SEE this barcode + number, click on the software and type in the number, and voila!!! You've reached the product's website...
Only problem is this seems rather a bit like you SEE a URL, open your web browser and type it in, and VOILA!!! You've reached the product's website. Seems like a crappier version of database-driven DNS...
Of course, you say, there's a BAR CODE on it, so eventually people will just SCAN the object's tag and have their computer go directly to that webpage!!! I still don't think this is right, though, as 1) Barcodes have already been done, 2) Barcode readers have already been done. The only thing papershit^H^H^H^Hclick can do is patent the software they make that opens up a web-browser, connects to the database and goes to the website. This sounds logical as their final plan. So unless this somehow gets copywritten, it shouldn't be a problem to create your own open-sourced database (companies would either also enter the database barcode entry into an open engine and the paperclick, or maybe not paperclick
Once again proving that people, on average, are fucking retards.
Shh! Nobody knows I'm gay!
Shh! Nobody knows I'm gay!
Well, the LambdaMOO server is available on SourceForge, and has been for some time. Not wanting to start a mini-flame-war about M** stuff, but if you want your virtual text-worlds to have more complexity than "hit orc with sword," MOO with the JHCore database is really just about the bext way to go (although ColdC is also pretty cool these days, if a bit more arcane and undocumented).
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And we also have Lunix. The Little Unix for C64 (Or should I say GNU/Lunix ?). Here are some screenshots.
MOD THE CHILD UP!
First, the press release was from NeoMedia not DC. So yes, of course, it sounded positive.
/. story (http://slashdot.org/articles/00/09/28/1351255.sht ml) I wrote:
Second, I'd just like to point out to everyone that I am all-knowing in that I foresaw this some time ago (actually, Stephen Satchell is the guru, but I think I deserve some points for spotting the guru). Specifically, under a previous
Theory of DC legal action (Score:3, Interesting)
by Col. Klink (retired) (wklink@yahoo.com) on Thursday September 28, @01:38PM EDT (#49)
(User #11632 Info)
Saw on flyingbuttmonkeys:
Step hen Satchell's theory behind the DC letters. Basically, DC is only going after barcode to web translations, not simply cuecat decoders. Even though DC has refused to answer what their "intellectual property" is, their letters have gone exclusively to sites that have software that can let you use your cat with the web. Satchell further points out that NeoMedia Technologies, not DC, actually have a patent on barcode to web lookups. NeoMedia is sitting on the patent until, I guess, there is enough money being made to jump in and begin extorting licensing fees...
-- Don't Tase me, bro!
Slashdot in Black! (or any set of colors you want).
Yes, anyone who has admined a Slash site should know this, but for those of you who haven't, there it is (including one of those annoying spaces probably).
You get the picture. IMHO, companies are either too lazy to get off their duffs and make something good, or too afraid of retribution by the patent holder of what they're designing. I'm still waiting for this "new" new economy to materialize (I love that mysap.com commercial)
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
Yes.
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Obfuscated e-mail addresses won't stop sadistic 12-year-old ACs.
Win dain a lotica, en vai tu ri silota
You know, if 5 years ago you had shown me that Digital Convergence press release, I would've laughed my ass off and congratulated you on your excellent use of fake buzzwords and your sarcastic take on corporate America.
"..the international leader in print-to-Internet enabling technology.."
"..cooperative efforts to assure that the consumer experience in this emerging space is positive.."
"PaperClick works by using .. numeric strings which are embedded in the print media."
"Entering a PaperClick code .. routes readers directly to relevant Web information."
And they're even having a PRESS CONFERENCE call about it. Hey, didja notice that they're using those fancy "paper-to-phone" technologies that link consumers DIRECTLY to a interactive telephone experience? Now that's an exciting and emerging space, and I'm glad they're enabling it!
Anyway, now when I see this press release I laugh for about 3 seconds then choke and go silent when I realize this is TOTALLY SERIOUS and these guys have LAWYERS..
A hack shouldn't really be considered "on the Internet" unless it plugs directly into a phone line, an Ethernet jack, or grabs packets out of the air using a wireless protocol.