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Microsoft's New Core OS Team Learning from Linux
sokk writes "Seems like Microsoft is paying attention to the Linux way of doing things. According to itworld.com, a new central engineering division will work on the core of Windows: "The Windows Core Operating System Division (COSD), within the company's Platforms Group, will be responsible for the core OS platform, including development, program management and testing, Microsoft said in a statement sent via e-mail.". A little further down the page analyst Rob Enderle: "They have been studying Linux extensively. Part of their study has been on how Linux has been able to maintain a high level of consistency in the kernel while groups around it maintain maximum flexibility,".
"
...whether they'll be "borrowing" some Linux code during their studies...
Thereby proving that you are unable to learn from the mistakes of others.
Microsoft does not have this failing.
Maybe someday we can all work together and learn from each other. Linux got a few ideas from windows. and windows from linux. Hey if windows can be more stable and work more for the user, more power to Microsoft.
Some software money can't buy. For everything else there's Micros~1
Microsoft is going to become more centralized to better compete with a competitor based highly distributed, decentralized development.
I'm amused, of course the proof will be in the bits.
Linux is Linux, if One need clarify their dist: <Dist>/GNU Linux
bsds are of course just BSD
Such as?
According to the Microsoft apologists and mr Gates himself there is no innovation in Linux...
Soon to come: a new development process invented by and patented by Microsoft.
This is the way that NT started. Dave had total control over the core (and the people) while Bill had control over the API on up. Then Bill took back control of all of it. Bill should have left Cutler in control of the core.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Developers on both sides of the fence tend to take what they like best about the other and incorporate it into their own.
Take the the desktop GUI for example. Despite what many people think about M$ they did create a fairly easy to use and consistant user interface. Both KDE and Gnome keep implementing the little things that will help them be more consistant and useable. (they have come a long way!)
Perhaps what M$ hopes to learn is not only about the kernel as stated in the article, but how Linux does things in general. The current root/user paradigm seems to work a whole lot better if you ask me than to give Grandma root privs on her Windows machine only to have her accidently delete something pretty critical because an E-mail said to.
Bottom line is there is a lot to learn on both sides of the fence.
So you got a bunch of MS core people who are _encouraged_ to look at the Linux kernel.
They got some really bright people there you know.
And what that bunch of bright hackers would want to do pretty soon? Contribute. Just like that Microsoft fellow from the original Haloween documents described - he had the urge to make changes, to improve the open-source code he looked at.
Even it they are prohibited from doing so (which I doubt - engineers and lawyers don't mix), the certain cross-contamination of the ideas is bound to happen.
This will lead to the whole bunch of interesting things - from super-SCO-sized legal battle to Longhorn Linux.
"Part of their study has been on how Linux has been able to maintain a high level of consistency in the kernel while groups around it maintain maximum flexibility,"
MS, here's a clue: Stop using undocumented/proprietary hooks into your OS from your apps.
Linux is the way it is (in reference to the above quote) because people stick to the "API"... partly because there's no other way, but that's another topic/philosophy alltogether.
- Preferences: Solaris 10 (servers), Ubuntu (desktops), Solaris 11 (personal servers) -
Microsoft is at another point in its company evolution where it sees a good idea and assimilates it into it's business and product strategy. It is unsuprising, given the fact that the company has in the past profitted from the innovations of others by refining and mass marketing them (i.e. Windows came from observing the innovation of Apple and Xerox's PARC, Internet Explorer came from the observing of Netscape, and the continuing development of PocketPC which came from the observation of Palm.) One can now only hope that they actually implement the philosophy of open source development that has made Linux one of the most robust and flexible operating systems, or whether they simply copy features.... time will tell.
one world | many people
"Microsoft Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates has called Longhorn the biggest Microsoft release of the decade and bigger than Windows 95." What's all the hoo hah about Longhorn? 64-bit support for the masses *who don't yet have 64-bit processors?
Well, maybe by the time it's finally released there will actually be some breakthrough for Windows equivalent to them adding TCP/IP stack in Win 95.
Rob Enderle makes more media pronouncements than just about any other analyst. In general he has no expertise and no information on which to base his statements.
I would completely discount any report that uses him as a source.
Don't take my word for it. Use Google and judge his veracity and competence for yourself.
Isn't this Slashdot? I though we wanted: (Linux) World domination, fast.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
And then you'd have two operating systems of more-or-less identical capability, except one is free and the other costs hundreds of dollars. Monopoly power is only going to get you so far in that situation.
Sean
MS needs a really level headed guy at the helm, like great cars, great operating systems come from a single person's drive and motivation, not a committee.
He has the ability to say "no" in a way that doesn't upset everyone.
Dave Cutler of VMS and WinNT fame comes to mind also.
Windows coders are not allowed to get anywhere near linux (or any other code). If a win coder needs to use a linux box, it will have absolutely NO source code on there anywhere. Code contamination scares the hell out of ms becasue if they end up with contaminated code the will be liable for huge amounts in damages and need to rework a large portion of windows(cause everything is intentionally over-integrated) in order to replace the offending code.
This is actually good programming technique. Keep your core simple and consistent so the outer layers can be flexible.
No electrons were harmed creating this post, though some may have been subjected to electrical and/or magnetic fields.
Shooting from the hip I'm taking this guess at the model for M$ future:
After WWII, Japan (well, Asia et.al.) learned to imitate US technology - we even helped them! Autos, Electronics, Watches and Cameras are prime examples.
The thing to watch for is what happened next - after Imitation came Innovation...and the popularity of those commodities took a swing to the East. The US economy took a pretty good hit, as I recall!
This is a wake-up call for Linux devs to stay sharp and keep up the steam of progress.
db
Cig:
ôô
It'll take them a while before they copy the "free as in Free Software" part.
It amazes me that a company can still charge a premium on what's basically a commodity component (scheduler, memory manager, etc) that's been around for decades. Same for that other company that's charging for relational databases. IMHO they should recognize that after 30 years these parts become commodities and that they need to find somethign else to sell if they want high margin products.
This makes you wonder if MS isn't thinking toward a future where they release the source to the NT kernel at it's smallest, simplest, runnable level.
They could keep the Win32 subsystem, the Windows GUI and everything that uses it closed and proprietary, giving them a huge set of products to sell while getting rid of all the objections to their practice of including things like IE in with the OS.
The kernel would almost certainly receive the same attention from developers that LINUX does regarding clustering, scalability, etc.
Imagine it - LINUX developers could create a kernel module exposing the NT API that Win32 uses and MS could sell all their software to LINUX users.
If linux wants to keep gaining headway, something is going to have to be done on the desktop; XFree is a hoggish bitch. Surely there could be a better X implimentation.
For philosophical reasons, I don't see MS's success as anything but bad. One, they are a large corporation, and in a related fashion, a (proven) monopoly. They leverage an obscene amount of power - it's like having a patent on water, in terms of today's business world. Such a large organization can not be unilaterally trusted with such power. This is why we're -supposed- to have a government: regulation of trade and things such as monopolies, so that the little guy does not get walked all over, and competition remains.
The future of software is in support, not development; everyone knows this. Microsoft's practices fly in the face, once again, of the little guy making money from such support - because he's simply not allowed the tools to do it. Hardly nobody does vehicle repairs in their own 2-car garrage. Most people bring their cars to mechanics for repair. What if those mechanics weren't allowed to know how those cars work? They wouldn't be able to do their jobs properly. What's more, if information on how the cars were made wasn't allowed to be made public, then Joe Tinkerer wouldn't be able to fix his own car, either.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
before MS releases an OS with a pseudo-OSS license. Something that allows perusal of source code, but 'all your changes are belong to us' would seem plausible. Oh, and they will also still charge for it, probably somewhere in line with Sun's Java OS.
After all, they already own Virtual PC for Mac - suppose MS did the same trick as Apple - take BSD and use their tools and APIs to make most Windows software run on it. Of course, those parts would be just as proprietary as the GUI on OS X - just the way MS likes it.
They've got enough programmers that they could simple go "open source" within the company, and that would be a big enough community to get all the benefits cited by ESR in his Cathedral paper.
A few other big companies could also do this if they wished.
Long term, I think, what Linus himself will be remembered for won't be the Linux kernel itself, but for how he managed the project. Hell, I personally know half a dozen people that could have done everything Linus did on the technical side of things, but I doubt any of them would have been the project manager he turned out to be.
how Linux has been able to maintain a high level of consistency in the kernel while groups around it maintain maximum flexibility
It's open source! Everyone that works in Linux can examine the code, learn from it and adopt the best features while scrapping those that don't work so well. Microsoft (from what I've heard, having never worked there) fosters a competitive atmosphere between groups that doesn't lend itself at all to the sharing of techniques. Deadline-driven timetables don't leave much time for reflection or study of other groups' efforts to see what works well and what doesn't.
creating a new central engineering division that will work on the core of the Windows OS (operating system)... By closely controlling the OS core, Microsoft will be able to better ensure that Longhorn will arrive on time and meet its quality and security objectives
I've always felt that one of the strengths of Linux is that it is not centralized and that development is not tightly controlled. Conversely, Windows has always had one hand at the tiller; Bill Gates'. Most of the design decisions that led to Windows' quality and security problems have been due to one man's philosophies about how the software should be written; Bill Gates'.
In short, it looks like they are trying to emulate processes that work well due to a lack of centralized control by imposing even tighter, more centralized control. They are trying to correct the problems stemming from one man's control of the design effort by giving him even tighter control over the design effort. This is doomed to failure.
But I agree, they won't call it "linux"... They'll say Unix.
philcrissman.com.
Perhaps an organizational change is entirely appropriate and the right thing. I don't think that anyone would seriously argue that MS doesn't have any good developers.
What they seem plagued by are marketing-driven technologies that keep getting bolted on to Windows, broadening the code base and making the overall focus of the development harder for anyone to see. This level of integration may make IIS faster or enable easier functionality for some third party development, also makes it hard to define what Windows core is and who's responsible for it.
A group of developers focused on the core of Windows (kernel, networking, filesystem) should be able to better focus on making it work well and keep security at a higher level, among other things.
The real challenge will be who defines what the core of Windows is, and what they define it to be. If they allow the scope of Windows core to be everything you get in C:\ after installing the OS, it won't be more than cosmetic. However, if they define it succintly and at least internally acknowledge that the kernel, the filesystem and the networking code is the core, and other stuff like IIS or Internet Explorer is not, this could mean real benefits for Windows.
It seems to me that Microsoft is nneding to revamp the way that they make their OS. If you read about the original development team it was 30 or so people for NT 3.1, a managable development team. NT 4.0 was a couple hundred and now the NT/XP team is huge and they are all working on the OS. The bug count last I heard was in the 40,000 - 60,000 region. It is simply to complex a system to keep track of all changes and bugs. In The Million Man Month they discuss there being no silver bullet for creating perfect software, but definitely putting more people on the team will not help.
I think it is great MS is changing the way they make OSs. If MS makes a good OS that is stable and secure, it raises the bar for everyone else to compete. They have to change their method. I think they have there divisions implement changes and Software QA verifies build stability the way that most Application development shops work. This seems impossible on the OS level. Linux is great because they have the UNIX design model to work with, everything laid out in a clean working fashion. The Kernel is so stable because they do not make major changes to the way user space is made because it just has to allow for UNIX applications to run (including X). All of the modules like memory and file systems are layed out. Microsoft has ruined their chance of using this model in Win XP by putting the GUI in kernel space, grabbing the messy registry system from Win 95, and whatever they could hack to make a consumer heavy duty OS.
Perhaps MS could have Linus Torvalds come in and be their OS development consultant for a day. They could elect someone as their Linus to check in every major change. They could add features for 6-12 months at a time, and test and revise changes for the next 6-12 months and blamo they have a Linux like development team.
- Kill Yourself, spare us all! -
It might also be due to Linux Kernel developers not being directly controllable by other areas of development (i.e. projects). For example with the mingling in Win95 of Explorer and the Kernel, for usability and not considering the consequences of such a decision.
Or the fact that the core team for the kernel is quite small and the direction of the kernel is ultimately controlled by this group.
This is likely to be an attempt to minimise the undue influence other departments have over the Windows Kernel development team. This being a good thing as it tries to prevent the projects goals being unduly subverted to make another projects life easier.
They didn't state that this was a kernel development team, though the name implies that the kernel will be part of their responsibilities. The core OS could include quite a bit more than the kernel. Kernel mode alone, in the diagram of the Longhorn OS, includes the kernel, HAL, device drivers, protocols (TCP, IPSEC, etc), portions of the storage and transaction systems, part of the DirectX graphics and audio drivers, input manager, memory, power, config, and process managers, plug and play, LPC, and so on. The 'Base Operating System Services' which includes the kernel mode portions also includes the window manager, GDI/GDI+, Direct3D, the CLR, and more of the storage and transactions subsystems. On top of all of that is the crap that's gotten the most attention recently, including Avalon, Indigo, WinFS, and the network class library (which might also be part of the Base OS services, it's hard to tell in the diagram).
Another thing that could be an explanation of this would be reaction to the antitrust cases not only at the federal level, but also from many of the states. If the Core OS is being developed by a seperate group, they could try to hold this up as an example of isolating the OS and API development from the application development, even within Microsoft itself. Of course, that also could backfire on them with any future efforts along the lines of IE and WMP, because they'd have to put more planning into integrating the needed features into the core OS before slapping together another product.
-PainKilleR-[CE]
People always think that MS is ahead for this reason or that reason. But in truth, there are exactly 2 reasons why MS is still #1.
Reason 1: People don't like change. Most of the population is incredibly illogically stubborn. They aren't willing to expend a small amount of effort to drastically increase their happiness afterwards because they don't want the temporary discomfort. They would rather stick with whatever crap they already have. You can always tell who they are by trying to get them to switch from IE to Firebird. Those who are willing to try and expend a little effort never go back. The rest of them see the benefits right in front of them, but they just wont change. I say, it's their loss.
Reason 2: Marketing. People just don't know about linux. Or they've heard the name and don't know what it means. If we had a super bowl commercial, let's say, that informed people of the following:
$200 of the cost of that computer you just bought was for MS Windows. Linux can do all the thigns you want. Linux doesn't crash. Linux is free. Software for linux is free. Never pay money for software again. Linux is secure. Don't worry as much about virii, etc. etc. You would see all those people who aren't afraid of change switch in an instant. Despite the increasing popularity of Linux and OSS, people still just don't know.
If you think that there is some other reason people are still using windows you are gravely mistaken.
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
I know your comment is meant to be humourous but on a serious note the difference between Apple and Microsoft leveraging the advantages of using opensource development is that Apple contributes back to the dogbowl where as Microsoft will just take whatever they want and then turn around and bad mouth the same projects. Sort of like what SCO is doing.
While I agree, it was only reciently when I've had to deal with the dozens of others within the same project.
Most of the time, the mix is "all good", "most all good", "a mix", and "nobody here knows how bad they really are".
WINE.. This is windows stuff? Hell better let them know, since they thought it was just an implementation of the WIN32 API's for Linux, This way things like games could work when written for Windows.
I just got the willies.. Yeah. If windows code got out, it's take all of a week for there to be new versions which actually worked and didn't have the annoying "where do you want to go today (as long it's along the path we tell you to)" mentality.
:)
This would be quite an event. Then again, the windows code may be so screwed up that the juice wounldn't be worth the squeeze.
At the very least, people would know how far to trust M$ products. I can't stop thinking about the Navy Destroyer running WinNT which was dead in the water for hours several years ago.
-=fshalor
They have interesting job opening right now as well:
Job Title: Software Development Engineer
Job Category: Software Development
Product: Not Product Specific
Job Code: 105577
Location: WA - Redmond
Why settle for working on an established product that everyone knows about when you can work on a top secret project that has not yet been announced. You can enjoy saying phrases like "I could tell you, but I would have to kill you" and "Hey, you can't tell anyone what I do". The project for which this job relates is one of them. Core requirements for a development position on this team are ability to work in a high paced environment as a contributing developer, very strong C++ design, analysis, coding, and debugging, strong communication and ability to work with other team members and groups, excellence in engineering, knowledge of Unix and/or Linux system-level functionality (threading, signal handling, memory management, for example), familiarity with server technologies such as Apache, IIS, ASP.NET, ADO.NET, web-services, and determination to make our platform the best in the world. Also required are a Bachelor's or Master's Degree in Computer Science or related discipline and a minimum of 4 years industry experience. Experience with and assembly level debugging skills on Power and SPARC processors are definitely a plus. Psst, hey buddy, want to work on something cool and top secret? Come on over here.
We don't. In fact, there was this very allegation a few years ago (along with some supporting proof) made by a group of developers. I don't think it ever went anywhere though.
Is there ANY way to tell if open source apps (not just linux) are becoming integrated into the windows codebase?
I don't think so. Even similar behaviour within the software isn't reasonable enough proof. But again, a few years ago there were some interesting things. Like a BSOD that referenced "/dev/null" LOL. Personally, I think they are integrating OSS code into their software and that is one of the reasons they don't want to open the code up.
Anthony Papillion
Advanced Data Concepts, Inc.
"Quality Custom Software and IT Services"
I mean that in a Microsoft-nuetral way. You either adapt or die off. So, its good to see MS take notice and change its style in some way. More compitition, better product for the consumer.
Software support. My company uses software that is just not available on Linux, both in the client and server realms. We know exactly what Linux is and how good it is, and even use it for a few specific Linux-supported server applications . . . but on the whole, Linux cannot do what we need it do, which is run software that we have a lot of time and money invested in (money that makes OS license fees look like spare change).
Your two points are valid, but are a gross oversimplification of the way things actually are. Many CTOs would gladly switch to Linux to save a little money, if it could run the right software.
... for the GPL licensed software patents they're obviously incorporating in their products? Oh sorry, no patents... it's free. Had the reverse been true, don't you doubt the PR would have stormed in crying the Communist Hippies had raped and stolen the innovative creation of successful individuals (thus impoverishing the whole world including Antartica and the depths of the Indian Sea). Oops, 'tis ha shame noone has patented the whole Free Software business process... it would have meant sue time.
Mi domando chi à il mandante di tutte le cazzate che faccio - Altan
I remember reading articles back in the 90's (remember, the last decade) that Microsoft was studying Unix and BSD kernels. Some of the impact seems to have shown up but overall it seems like not too much has changed.
Until Microsoft isolates the the kernel calls from user based calls don't hold your breath waiting for a change. Given the legacy code they support I don't think any big improvement will be soon.
"There is magic in the web." - Othello Act 3 Scene 4.
Not to mention that in OSS every interested party in the entire world can see where you have been lazy and/or stupid... If that is not a strong motivation for churning out quality code I don't know what is!
Yup. When I ported amd76x_pm driver from 2.4 to 2.6 and posted it onto lkml, I got some remarks on overall code quality. All I did was just a quick hack into changed infrastructure so that it would 'just work'. And then I was getting questions like 'what is this', 'why are there large integer constants' etc. I sure learned not to post inadequate code onto lkml then :)
fucktard is a tenderhearted description
Just a guess, but offhand I'd say it through design driven by software developers, versus design driven by marketing and artificial deadlines. In other words, in any organization, the behaviours that get rewarded the most increase, while those that get punished decrease. MS apparently does not reward consistent, flexible design or implementation.
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
The GPL is strictly based on copyright. You can copy ideas from it, just as long as you don't copy code. You are confusing this with the type of NDA you have to sign to see code from Microsoft. Also Microsoft is very interested in spreading the myth that even looking at GPL code can "contaminate" you, in order to make it sound as bad as their NDA, and you are buying right into this. It isn't, and they know this. So I would not be suprised if they let their top people (the ones trusted to not blab that Microsoft is not practicing their own propaganda internally) to look at Linux source code all they want.
Serious designers want to do things differently, and it turns out that copying source code is pretty useless for this anyway.
Not that I agree with the parent, but Operatings Systems are a hell of a lot more interesting, and people tend to work on what interests them. Not only would Unix programmers be checking it out, so would the many more Windows programmers.
Why do I keep typing pythong?
Of course, it has to be noted that NT had a modular kernel and was POSIX compliant well before Linux was. In fact, both of those were design requirements of NT from the beginning.
i don't see how that could be true.
nt4.0 is pretty decent. win2k...well, it's evolutionary. it's a bit more stable then nt.
additionally, during the peak of win2k development, linux wasn't even on the microsoft radar.
xp is just a quick fix up win2k.
microsoft's reaction to linux is HUGELY delayed.
almost like hitting a dinosaur in the toe.
their longhorn release will backup your statement.
but you are pretty way off the mark.
Microsoft is between the proverbial rock and hard spot. If you consider historical trends and rates of development, Linux is profoundly faster in the rate at which it has been developed than any proprietary OS. Linux once was notorious for its problems with device drivers. These days that problem is long gone. It has been argued that Windows was more convenient and once that was true, but these days, the convenience of not having to reboot Linux after and installation alone reflects poorly on windows, especially when comparatively trivial progams require a reboot to work after installation. The historical evidence suggests that within a comparatively short time Linux user interfaces will be far better than anything MS has. You can argue that linux already has this, but not everyone will agree.
Presently, the only sound reason for using Windows is for the applications and with Open Office and Star Office as well as many others, even this is becoming a weak argument.
Microsoft cannot afford to ignore the manner in which Linux develops. The irony of course is that they can't afford to emulate it as a proprietary company either. The fact is, MS cannot afford to hire a work force of the size and qualifications that marks the group that developes Linux.
------ The only greater hazard to your liberty than n politicians is n+1 politicians.
Right now, the Average Computer User (ACU) was probably born when personal computers didn't even exist. Look ahead 50 years, and that won't be the case. The ACU will be much more familiar with computers, and there will be no need to coddle them as much.
I disagree. I believe the Average Computer User will remain approximately as well-informed as they are today. They will know how to turn it on (as long as nothing goes wrong), and use a few applications (as long as the work properly). Most people believe that a little computer knowledge grants expert status:
- A friend thinks his 6-year-old child is a computer genius because she can use the mouse to play children's games.
- Another friend thinks his teenagers are computer literate. They know how to download songs.
- A college student thought another student was very computer literate because he found her "lost" document in the "My Documents" folder.
- A friend's friend at a party was hailed as a computer genius because he could install anti-virus software, start the scan, and remove viruses if the software knew how.
When I started with computers, they could play a few games. They often required typing in the source code. (We did not call it "open source" then. "Closed source" came on plug-in cartridges, or was in the BIOS. Everything else was open.) I quickly decided it was more fun to program a game than to play a game.
In the early 90s, the computer world exploded. Suddenly tons of people were seen as computer literate because they knew how to "program in HTML". Then the techies added JavaScript. Some of these "web developers" survived by copy/pasting (otherwise known as "stealing", or "borrowing" since all JavaScript is "open source") JavaScript from other sites, or from new websites that collected easy-to-implement code.
None of the people mentioned are likely to become techies. There is also a class of people known as "administrators" who have basic knowledge of installing programs and rebooting computers. They fill the boring roles in the computer world that programmers do not want. (Network architects and a few other jobs are more engineers than techies, and so are not part of this discussion.) Using "scripting" languages has reduced the intelligence/competence/skill-level-required to program, and that is good because we need more programmers, and we have fewer.
The bar for being considered "computer literate" by the public is very low, while the bar for becoming a programmer has been raised. I really started programming on a Commodore PET. IIRC, it booted to a command line that also served as the IDE for BASIC.
- What IDE do I use in Windows? DOS Help was hidden in the extras on the Windows95 CD. QuickBASIC disappeared. MS wants you to use VisualStudio (after giving them much money,) but how many 10-year-olds can afford it.
- Java is easy to install, after waiting for the download, but compiling requires the command line. (I use batch files. Raise your hand if you know what is a batch file. OK. Now explain to that newbie who wants to be a programmer.)
- The best bet for a newbie is to ask for someone's old computer, install Linux, and start playing with all those compilers. But that newbie already knows they want to program. The casual entry of source code is gone.
Computers must become get easier for the average person to use, while programmers become rarer. At least we are guaranteed good income.
I spend my life entertaining my brain.
I'm happy for that. This will make Windows more secure, which will relieve many people out there.
Also, another way to look at it is that this will force Linux developers to come up with even better ideas and techniques to try and stay one step ahead. Competition is a Good Thing (tm).
"Dear pedantic Slashbots: If cable theft is stealing, why is MP3 downloading "infringement?""
Because (at least for USians) that's what the law says.
Theft of 'telecommunications services', such as cable, are defined and punished under USC Title 47, Chapter 5, Subchapter V-A, Part IV, Sec. 553. That section can be found here.
USC Title 17, Chapter 5 covers copyright infringement, which is an entirely different animal. You may view this section of the USC here.
If reading legalize hurts your head (as it does mine), then try reading here instead. That link leads to a far easier-to-digest version of the laws in play.
If you live in a foreign country where copyright infringement equals theft, then please let us all know where this enlightened utopia is. If you live in the US, then your sig is nothing more than the butt-end of a joke played upon the American public by a group of criminals running a group of corrupt organizations (as defined under Federal RICO statues) which should have been shut down years ago, with their board members imprisoned for their crimes.
I find it amusing that so many voice their support for the rule of law by defending a group of companies and individuals (whose collective criminal activities over the past 50 some-odd years could result in massive (as in Trillions) government-imposed fines and a slew of life sentences (for execs)) from small children and teenagers who, at worst, are commiting a civil offense.
Please change your sig.
-- "Government is the great fiction through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."