Slashdot Mirror
Slashback: Brainwaves, MPnothin', Telescopy
They felt your unvoiced contempt. perl-guy writes "According to a recent NASA press release, reports such as those in this Slashdot story stating that NASA is planning to develop mind-reading equipment for airports in efforts against terrorism are exaggerated and ignore the facts and science behind current research. 'NASA does not have the capability to read minds, nor are we suggesting that would be done,' said Robert Pearce, Director, NASA's Strategy and Analysis Division in the Office of Aerospace Technology in Washington. 'Our scientists were asked to think outside the box with regards to ideas that could aid the nation in the war on terrorism and that's what they are doing. We have not approved any research in this area and because of the sensitivity of such research, we will seek independent review before we do.'"
Let's put that Schneier fellow on the "body-search" list. Quixotic1 writes "Four articles are highlighted over at The Atlantic Online arguing that to protect ourselves against terrorism we must rely on people, not simply on technology. The outline touches on the recent article about Bruce Schneier, the national ID card proposal, and the Clipper Chip."
Star systems, slip through fingers, etc. Since Thomson Multimedia / the Frauenhofer Institute has decided to press the $0.75-per-decoder charge for MP3 decoders mentioned earlier today, there are probably a lot of people suddenly more interested in other formats. I favor the Xiph Foundation's Ogg Vorbis; Xiph CEO Emmett Plant has written his thank-you note to Thomson Multimedia.
Depends what you consider "great." morhoj writes "ZDNet is running a great commentary that talks about the recent debate involving the Digital Software Security Act (the California law the would force governments to use open source software). ''Open source is supposed to be about freedom. Unfortunately, certain advocates have lost sight of that goal.'' I couldn't have summed it up better myself. Forcing anyone to use Open Source software is no better than ludicrous Microsoft licensing agreements." I think Carroll is dead-wrong when he focuses on cost-benefit analyses (and ignores the question of whose money is being spent by whom, for what), but YMMV.
I bet they'd have to edit Super Troopers, too. David_Bloom writes: "Following up on an earlier article, according to a page (link is a direct link to a frame - context sold separately) on the IMAX website, the first movie to use 35mm to 70mm IMAX DMR technology will be the hit 1995 flick Apollo 13. It is interesting to note that, according to a FilmRatings.com lookup, the film has been edited for content for its IMAX release (which is bad news for people hoping to see The Matrix or similar movies on IMAX)."
No, I said I'm meet you by the other telescope! Reader Dan Yocum points out that the skyward-gazing Yalies who captured asteroid 2002 NY40 digitally did so with a different telescope than the one reported. He writes: "They weren't even using WIYN. They were using the 0.9M that's next to it (about 50yd away)." Thanks for the correction!
Bleh. What's the point? Especially with Apollo 13? I guess they think they need to try to cater to EVERYONE which as we all know, means making everything suck. Just look at network tv.
It would be interesting to see a reply to that letter. :)
Is there anyone else who thinks 2001: A Space Odyssey would make an excellent choice for an IMAX release? It was beautifully filmed, it's already in 70mm, it's G-rated, and has a multichannel soundtrack. It's a great movie, too.
The only problem might be its length, 150 minutes or so. Still, it's nice to dream, isn't it?
Of course going from one lossy to another lossy format introduces even more errors, degrading the signal further. I doubt this is an option for you, but if you wanted to go the ogg route, I'd recommend that you re-rip from the original CDs. You did originally rip from CDs, right?
:-) I hardly expect to get support for that here), with the "song protection" licensing BS turned off. I personally found that 128Kbps WMA sounded better than either OGG or MP3. I gave MP3Pro a listen, but it seems to be only intended for low bitrates, and player support is limited.
After much hair pulling, I recently ripped much of my CD collection, and after quite a lot of listening tests, I went with 128Kbps WMA (egads!
Its not like you can't project 35mm on an IMAX screen right now. The Irvine Spectrum in southern cali does it all the time. I've seen spiderman, star wars and minority report on their huge IMAX screen that they show their 3D IMAX films on during the day. On nights and weekends though, they can pack huge opening weekend audience in to the big screen auditorium and make a lot of cash. The picture is obviously not as sharp as an IMAX film up close but if you don't sit too close (adjust for the relative screen size), it doesn't look bad at all! They project it to utilize the entire width of the screen and the speaker system in there... damn. =)
Can somemone explain to me how much is gained by doing this expensive process on 35mm film? Is it really worth it when existing 35mm movies don't look half bad on IMAX screens already?
--Let's hack root on 127.0.0.1 --panZ
Convert your mp3's to ogg? Nah, please don't even try because each method throws away different things, and to ogg an mp3 by way of decoding the mp3 to a wav and then ogging the wav is going to sound pretty bad because too much has been removed.
You'll say ogg sounds like hell, giving ogg a bad rep in your mind, and spread it to anyone who will listen. It is better sounding than mp3 when working at about the same compression ratio, by very obvious differences, but you must, to be fair to each method, start with the original material.
Since the majority of us already have mp3 players that work pretty well, I'd make floppy backups of them so they can be installed in the next os upgrade, preferably in tar.bz2 format since thats a lot more universal than rpm's or deb's.
In essence, they think they have us by the short hair now, just like Unisys thought, but IMO, and IANAL, it seems to me that they can't make us pay retroactively for the versions we had the day before they got greedy.
Of course, software is unique as its production relies purely on the mind.
I can think of several offhand, the first being the literature industry. The second being the music industry. There are numerable industies in our world that exist soley to produce IP and nothing else. All of these industries have "Open Source" movements of thier own, but none of them benifit from the internet nearly as much as OSS does. What makes OSS so important is the fact it was developed in a time when worldwide data communication suddenly became free and instant, coming from 7 day snail mail for 32c thats a huge improvment.
The thing that really differentiates the software industry from other IP products, is that software can be developed in a team. I would hate to read a novel writen by a rag tag team of developers, or a song with the music and voice tracks writen by two random contributors who had never met eachother before. It dosen't work nearly as well as software for obvious reasons.
Free software, however, is only a problem if you hope to sell software.
Replace software with comodity software, as he explains later on. And as I will explain later "free software" for the goverment is perfectly possible using existing "proprietary" software.
Free certainly doesn't cause complaints among consumers, although it might lead to fewer choices due to fewer competitors entering the market (profits attract competition).
It might also lead to world peace (sharing data is a form of altrusim). Absurd arguments don't get you very far here...
Retailers such as Wal-Mart can benefit if consumers flock to products made cheaper through the use of open source software.
Yes they can, and if it gets the job done for the consumer then all is good. It seems he agrees with me here.
Even developers can benefit, as there is ample room for custom software, which fills the gap between general-purpose open source product and tailored software designed for a particular business (often of the proprietary sort which generates revenue as long as it doesn't grow big enough to attract the attention of free software developers).
Where exactly are the software developers helped by being forced to work in a non-mainstream field? I'm sorry but this paragraph flatly contradicted itself in it's hypothesis and argument.
These good things, however, in no way justify forcing people to use open source products.
Are we positive that this is an exaustive list? In fact I don't believe the reason for this bill has even been brought up yet.. While the reasons cited so far might not be enough reason, I am almost positive there is just cause for a "Free Software" (a la Peru) bill. I will admit though, I am no more the political scientist of economist than the next guy, and I cannot reliably predict all the effects of such a bill.
I have no problem with companies that choose to use open-source software. I also have no problem with governments that choose it.
Good, because it would be ineffective and absurd to claim you have a problem with the use of public IP. As if the existance of public IP that was just as good as commercial IP should flatly be ignored just because it public.
I have a very big problem with groups that try to force governments to favor open source software exclusively.
If you define OSS software as software that follows the pillars stated below:
What exacly could the agument against OSS sofware if you define it so. This is what I would expect from any tax funded agency when there is such an alternative. In the select few situations where there is no OSS solution, it would make sense to grant a special case and allow the purchase of said software. Other than those two cases, what argument is there? I cannot see one, and I would love to be enlightened.
Mandating that governments only procure open source software would be a form of government protection, allowing open source to avoid competition from proprietary alternatives.
When proprietary alternatives don't fit the pillars of OSS I laid out previously, it is inapropriate for the goverment to use it. I am willing to debate this point further, but I believe it is obvious that a goverments responsibility is to have open reliable data formats. Proprietary software is capable of fulfilling my OSS pillars above, in fact microsoft is capable of changing very little in thier UELA, and giving the gvt a NDA to sign, and windows would fit inside the OSS pillars stated above.
When the Anti-OSS example, Windows, is capable to fit under the goverment mandated pillars of OSS, is it really the goverments fault to require that microsoft provide them with the features they require? I would love to be able to walk into consulting interviews and say "I know these were your requirments, but honestly I don't like them, I want to keep all IP I develop for you, sorry". That dosen't seem like a very good way to win a contract to me.
The irony is rich indeed when proponents of open source decry on one hand a "monopoly" whose dominance is built entirely on consumer choice, and on the other promote a government-protected one of the sort Adam Smith explicitly warned against.
The goverment is required to set fair limitations on who it will give money to. In order to maintain state security, and provide the required open and reliable data formats to the public, the OSS pillars I have dictated earlier are apropriate limitations in the field of software. I'm not sure exacly which Adam Smith argument you are pushing, but I would love to counter if if you would be so bold as to extend it fully. It is perhaps true that some OSS proponents wish a state mandated OSS monopoly, but that is far from the standard case. This is really a straw man though, because OSS is a philosophy, and I'm sure I can find a contradiction between two believers of any philosophy. Incase someone took down that you pushed that this state contract OSS initiative was in any way a effort to counter certain monopolies, it's not. The state should require the pillars of OSS stated above in order to perform it's basic functions to the citizen body.
I think Tim O'Reilly put it best when he said, in a recent weblog: "...any victory for open source achieved through deprivation of the user's right to choose would indeed be a betrayal of the principles that free software and open source have stood for."
This is clearly out of scope. Tim O'Reilly is refering to the users right to choose between several products. This debate is over the goverment mandating the pillars of OSS in the name of security, data reliablity, and open data formats; What this argument is not about is the pillars of OSS as they apply to consumers and buisnesses. Quoting Adam Smith, I'm sure your well aware that the state and private insititutions must uphold entirely diffrent values.
Some say that the "Digital Software Security Act," as the California proposal is disingenuously called, isn't true protection. Proprietary companies just have to open their source code in order to compete for government contracts.[irony implied]
As I have stated many times, the goverment is setting standards over what it should require from software. It's the software providers responsibility to apease the goverment, not the other way around. You really make no counter argument here, you just claim this is not so. To counter I say that it is so.
Well, America just has to stop growing GM (Genetically Modified) food to gain access to European markets, even though all scientific evidence indicates that GM food is not harmful.
This is true, they do. Whats your point? I can cite the reasons to disalow GM food, but that is completly and totally beyond the scope of this dicussions.
E-Commerce sites in the US just have to adhere to European VAT rules to be allowed to sell to Europeans.
Yes they do. Again, this is totally offbase and provides nothing to the dicussion. It is not a support to the above point, because your above point was not a point.
Europeans just have to buy struggling American steel companies to avoid getting hit by George W's recent steel tariffs.
I'm not seeing how a european owned steel company exporting goods to europe is going to have any less tarrifs, but I have not followed this. Again straw man.
In other words, the fact that companies can alter their business structure in order to get around a "non-trade" barrier doesn't make it any less of a trade barrier.
No you have argued that tarrifs and trade regulations effect free trade. You have not shown in any way that regulations on goverment awarded contracts are a harm to free trade. Again straw man, and out of scope.
There are a number of important reasons why proprietary software companies might not want to open their source code, chief among them that revenue models based around the sale of an open source product aren't exactly known for their profits.
Is this support for your point with the [irony] in it? If so it is not the goverments responsibility to allow all bidders to bid, it is the goverments responsibility to uphold the ideas of security (no back doors), reliability of data, and open data formats for citizen audits. The goverment has no other responsibility in this situation that we have discussed so far, and I would love to see you try and counter this.
The trade barrier, in this case, operates through the fact that most companies currently making proprietary software would sooner replace their executive team with orangutans than discard a revenue model with a proven track record.
They don't have to discard that revenue model, they just have to provide the goverment full source under NDA. This argument is leaning towards absurditiy, but is still valid. Unfortunatly there is no trade barier. The goverment has no responsibility to break from its requirments simply to stimulate trade under a particular philosophy. It is unforunate that people have come to associate OSS always with FSF, because OSS in this situation is simply the following of the three pillars I laied out earlier.
Of course, who says anyone should care about the plight of proprietary software companies? Open source code is free, and that's a good thing as stated at the beginning of this article. Why shouldn't government get the most bang for its buck from our tax dollars?
The cost of a product in tax dollars pales in comparison to the requirment of the goverment to avoid backdoors and provide it's citizens with open formated data. The goverment should be worried about functionality and responsibility before cost when the cost increase is not absurd.
If you accept that argument, however, you are trapped in a logical conundrum. If you truly believe that government should get the most bang for its buck, then you must reject a policy that would prevent the government from doing a proper cost-benefit analysis to determine what, truly, provides the most bang for the buck.
Your mythical "Bang for the Buck" is again of no consequence in this discussion. The goverment has a responsibility to the voting public to uphold the three pillars of OSS stated above, and cost is secondary to them by far.
As I mentioned in a past article, good ideas aren't the exclusive domain of open source programmers. What if a particular government agency would benefit the most from standardizing on Oracle databases? Perhaps its personnel are trained on Oracle, or Oracle developers are easier to find than MySQL developers. Perhaps Oracle works better with existing systems, or other products in the marketplace. Perhaps there are more development tools available, or more add-on software that the agency finds useful. Perhaps, horror of horrors, Oracle is just BETTER than the open source alternative, at least with respect to the features that matter to the agency in question.
Then if they can provide the citizens with open formated data, and the system is proven not to have a back door, it is apropriate for special situations to get grants to non OSS software. In almost no situation is it not worth investigating the alternatives though. Also since oracle can simply provide the code to a single agency under NDA, it is absurd that oracle would fail to fall under the pillars of OSS stated above if they really want the contract.
All that MIGHT just add up to making Oracle worth the money some government agency spends on it.
It very well might, again that is of no consequence to the fact they are giving up the ability to protect themselves from rogue corperations, or meer employees of said corperations. And if they fail at all three pillars of OSS, they also would not provide a reliable data solution to the taxpayers, nor would they allow the citizens to keep the goverment in check. This raises the bar on goverment data from literacy to reverse engineering training, a huge jump for any organization to take lightly.
A policy that mandates that government not be allowed to make that calculation is a policy that will result in less efficient usage of tax dollars, as government is forced to favor an open source option even if, in the aggregate, a proprietary solution was more cost effective.
Again, as I have countered above, being cost effective is not the end all when it comes to goverment. Goverements are required to adhere to the values stated many times by me now, not just save cash getting the quickest solution.
Over time, things can only get worse. Protectionism impoverishes a country, which is why nations around the world are busy opening their markets to foreign competition. What applies at the macroeconomic level applies at the microeconomic level. Protectionism won't help the progress of open source any more than it boosts the efficiency of protected industries in Chile (or steel companies in the United States).
I believe we have concluded that the goverment setting requirments on software, that it buys, which are in the interest of the democratic public, is not protectionism any more than requiring certain specs when getting roads done is.
Open source is supposed to be about freedom.
Said who, what, where, why, when, how.
Unfortunately, certain advocates have lost sight of that goal.
This has nothing to do with RMS vs. Bill gates, it has everything to do with code auditability, data reliablity, and open formats for data.
People should be free to use software which best fits their needs, whether or not it adheres to a particular programming philosophy.
Key word there is people, isn't it? It tires me how you mix and match peoples interestes and the goverment interest. The goverment has completly diffrent responsibilites than a free citizen, this should be obvious to a Adam Smith scholar of all people.
I suggest that open source proponents spend their time crafting interoperability guidelines rather than creating a protected environment, which artificially boosts open-source adoption while hiding it from the full rigors of competition.
I would state again it's not a protected envirment, but my tounge might fall out. Instead I'll just move on.
The goverment clearly has diffrent responibilities than a citizen, and thus has diffrent requirments. Some of those responsibilities require them to use OSS products, but that does not mean they need to back RMS. Even a product that releases its source under strict NDA is acceptable to the goverment, and it is perfectly valid that the goverment require this. A goverment must use open standards whenever possible, thusly they must audit the code to assure adherence to open standards. The goverment must also assure the ability to read its data in 10 years, the only way to promise this is open standards and non-expiring software, both of which are concepts of the "Goverment OSS" philosphy.
I think it's evident that the goverment upholding its responsibilities to citizens is in no way a protectionist envirment. If the goverment set absurd tarrifs, or required
I would love to hear a reply to this, as I'm sure I missed several points, and probably left myself wide open to some attacks. My email is sfritz@postmaster.co.uk
I live in a giant bucket.
I would like to point out that pdf files are not 'open' formats. As a matter of fact, you can't get any more closed or proprietary than the Patented 'Portable' Document Format, which has almost 102 related patents.
Yes, PDF is 'free as in beer' but in no way is it an 'open' model, nor is it a 'standard' but rather a 'de facto standard' like 'flash.' Because it's patented, because it's owned Adobe can say "anyone who want's to sell or give away a program that can read or convert PDFs has to pay us $.75 cents per copy of software..."
There is an industry standard, it's called PostScript, but unfortunately, that too is entangled with patents, and the main issue with PostScript is that the fonts needed to render PS files correctly are mostly owned (by adobe no less), although you can use free fonts to replace them, this can cause any munber of formatting issues. Adobe maimed postscript through insane fees on their fonts (to complement a laser printer with a full set of PostScript fonts may cost easily $600 or more), to force people into using pdf, which comes with all those owned adobe fonts supported 'free'.
PDF isn't free, and adobe may well decide they need to crack down on programs that allow people to open pdfs or convert them to other formats. Especially if they believe there is money to be made from it.
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html
According to the Way Back Machine:
n sing.com/royalty/swdec.html
m p3licensing.com/royalty/software.html
Feburary 8, 2001:
http://web.archive.org/web/20001212023000/mp3lice
mp3 Software Decoders/Players distributed free-of-charge via the Internet for personal use of end-users
No license fee is expected for desktop software mp3 decoders/players that are distributed free-of-charge via the Internet for personal use of end-users.
Then in August 2001 no mention is made of the no mention of exemption for freely distributed players (and the rate is only 50 cents per player):
http://web.archive.org/web/20010820181631/http://
Looks like the rate was increased to $.75 in November 2001.