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Slashback: Newton, Wal-Mart, Eats
Honestly, where would they have unloaded that anyway? yorgasor writes "Yahoo reports that the stolen copies of Newton's Principia have been successfully recovered. The thieves are also suspected of other thefts from several Moscow and St Petersburg libraries."
They have everything. An anonymous reader writes "Looks like Lycoris joins Lindows and Mandrake in being preloaded for walmart.com: 'The new $199 Desktop/LX Certified MicroTel PCs include the Desktop/ LX operating system. Desktop/LX also includes the following incredible software features without any additional downloading:'"
Who needs a war? Krieger writes "I found this link to the definitive browser wars at HardOCP, where you get to play checkers to prove your browsers superiority. Taking the browser wars to a new high/low?"
Here's the hook, can you pass that sinker please ... JoeWalsh writes "According to this article, earlier this month RMS visited India and tried to convince them to use Free (as in freedom) Software. Then along comes Bill Gates this month, handing out free (as in beer) software, and suddenly India isn't interested in RMS's message. A choice quote: "We are a poor country. We cannot develop operating systems and platforms on our own." Did RMS tell them they couldn't use GNU/Linux, or is this more Microsoft propaganda at work?"
If you are going to build a government office, which do you want to spend, $100 an hour for 2 days for a contractor who will set up a linux server and show you how to set up linux machines, or $300 for each of 200 copies of xp, plus a $150 an hour contractor to set up an insecure xp or maybe a novell sever, plus $90 * 200 for each copy of ofice, plus $god only knows * 200 for the administrative software? (this isnt all, but the rest will be shared no matter what OS)
When life gives you crap, Make Crapade.
Sluggy Freelance.
If Microsoft is supporting India's many languages out of the box, I could understand the decision. If on the other hand the Indians have to compute in English anyway, it makes no sense. I suspect massive bribery was involved.
- Have a picture
during the peru thing, going along gates offer of money, was great pressure from the us government through its ambassador:, 1367,54141,00 .html
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0
New motto for the new millenium:
Freedom? Yes!
for us
>>A choice quote: "We are a poor country. We
>>cannot develop operating systems and platforms
>>on our own."
Oh come on now, I know India cant be that bad off. Its not like India doesn't have loads of talent, look how fast it Inidans get snapped up (well relatively fast) by corps here in the US.
But as others have said it may just be lip service. Hey if I was the leader of a country and someone donated as much money as Bill did to fight AIDS I'd say just about anything.
But thats still sounds like a lousy copout to me.
--- I was far from home, and the spell of the Eastern sea was upon me. -Lovecraft-
Perhaps the fact that Gates announces $100-million support to fight AIDS in India has something to do with the change of tune. That and $12.5 million to improve immunisation services.
At least all the money people sink into M$ is going somewhere good. Too bad we have less of our own money to give away ourselves.
My "old" Celeron 366s on an Abit BP-6 have NO problem running X and generating more than 1000 frames per second when running glxgears through my Voodoo4 4500.
It's true that the Via C3 is not a modern processor design but it is PLENTY adequate for running Linux.
As for the target market for these machines, well who knows
My question is this
utter rubbish
My question is this ... does ANYone have any idea how many Linux boxes Wal-Mart.com is selling and what kind of customers they are selling them to?
Well, I have no idea how many they're selling, but I do know I'm a customer who's thinking of buying one.
Application: router/VPN server for a small wireless network.
Reasons: It's cheap, and it's *good enough*. This is what many don't understand. A lot of people now sneer at a Via C3 800Mhz... but think about it... for many applications that's MORE than adequate. As is the 128 MB of SDRAM and the 10GB HD. It has almost everything I need built in. All I'd have to add is one NIC (it already has one on-board). The proc can run in heatsink-only designs, so I should n't have to worry too much about leaving it in a closet somewhere. If the fan dies, the box will probably just keep chugging as if nothing happened.
All I have to do when I get the box: Install another NIC. Wipe the hard drive, load slack. Configure firewall/routing rules. Set up VPN server. Set up anything else I may want, such as Apache, DNS, etc.
Keep in mind there will only be a few users at a time on the box. Plenty of power left over. Seems like a good deal to me.
You see, it was like this. RMS came to our (non-descript, but *very* highly funded) university a couple of months back, evangelising on copyright misuse. The lecture theater was full to the brim of course and the audience, mostly consisting of CS grads, were quite taken by his rather impressive beard and his persistent plucking of his nose. Not to debase his talent or vision, but he has some very interesting stage-habits.
Fast forward to a couple of weeks back when Steve Ballmer made a stopover at our university. The theater, this time the largest available, was again filled to the brim. The university President shared the dais with him and we all had to register for the talk with our name and university IC No. The official reason for the registration is that seats are limited, which, in any case, was a sort of valid reason; seats were booked within two days of the announcement. Needless to say, everyone (that is, from all faculties) turned up to watch him speak.
I wasn't down at Mr. Ballmer's talk, but friends tell me that it had very little to do with the stated topic "Innovation and Entreprenuership" and more to do with X-Boxes and Tablet PC's. Ballmer's shiny scalp was, I believe, impressive, but apparently the audience found the X-Boxes and Tablet PC's more interesting.
Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if someone told me that Bill Gates made a better impression on India than RMS.
More than mere navel gazing.
Think about it. This is WalMart telling Joe Sixpack that Linux is the way to go. In their words "Desktop/LX is an exciting new Linux-based operating system (OS) that offers a user-friendly, powerful and open alternative to Microsoft Windows." Hundreds of thousands of kids are going to be doing their homework on those boxes.