Slashback: OpenSSH, Falwell, OpenDRM

Slashback tonight brings some corrections, clarifications, and updates to previous Slashdot stories including the Supreme Court declines Falwell's appeal, GP2X now shipping in the US, a new version of Systrace released, Lessig and Stallman look back at Sun's OpenDRM, NASA jumps on the anti-matter propulsion bandwagon, GoDaddy donates $10,000 to OpenSSH, Ellison explains why he would NOT acquire Novell or Red Hat, and pictures of the Ball State wireless 'sculpture' -- Read on for details.

The Supreme Court declines Falwell's Appeal. yEvb0 writes "The US Supreme Court has refused to hear the appeal of Jerry Falwell, who claims that "gripe site" http://www.fallwell.com/ infringes on his trademark by luring surfers away from his own site. Despite winning a case in federal court, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals disagreed with Falwell last year and said that operator Christopher Lamparello was free to operate his site about Falwell's views on gays because he 'clearly created his Web site intending only to provide a forum to criticize ideas, not to steal customers.'"

GP2X now shipping in the US. An anonymous reader writes "The Gamepark GP2X, a Linux-based handheld gaming platform that runs native and emulated games, is now shipping in the US, according to LinuxDevices. The device can reportedly run more than a thousand classic arcade games, through open-source console game emulators such as MAME, SNES, Genesis, and PC Engine. It has a 3.5-inch QVGA (320x240) color TFT LCD screen, and includes a media player supporting MPEG, JPEG, and MP3 formats."

New version of Systrace released. Niels writes "I just recently released a new version of Systrace that runs on Linux without requiring any kernel patches. I termed it the Phoenix release because it has been almost three years since I did any work on Systrace. However, I finally had the need to do some sandboxing on Linux without being able to change the kernel. So, voila, after a few late nights, here we go: Systrace for Linux using a ptrace back end."

Lessig and Stallman look back at Sun's OpenDRM. H4x0r Jim Duggan writes "The Register has an excellent article featuring Lessig and Stallman on 'Open Source' DRM. The spark for the article came from comments made about Sun's 'OpenDRM' by Lessig which were not wholly negative and were interpreted by some as an endorsement. Lessig clarifies: 'There's no disagreement about where we should end up - No DRM.'"

NASA jumps on the anti-matter propulsion bandwagon. steveo777 writes "NASA has an interesting read about creating yet another form of rocket propulsion. They plan on using Anti-electrons (positrons) combine with normal electrons to release enough energy to fuel the way to Mars and back. Its byproduct will be lower energy gamma radiation. From the article, '"Our advanced designs, like the gas core and the ablative engine concepts, could take astronauts to Mars in half that time, and perhaps even in as little as 45 days," said Kirby Meyer, an engineer with Positronics Research on the study.'"

GoDaddy donates $10,000 to OpenSSH. wcbrown writes "Go Daddy has donated $10,000 to the OpenSSH project, which is apparently used extensively within the company." This is another great donation in what hopefully will continue to be a trend within the community. No word on when the blinking will stop.

Ellison explains why he would NOT acquire Novell or Red Hat. Robert writes to tell us CBROnline is reporting that a recent statement by Larry Ellison covered so extensively in the news regarding speculation about why Oracle might be "planning to buy Novell or Red Hat" may have been a little off base. The full transcript of his interview with the FT is illuminating precisely because it reveals why the company would NOT acquire either Novell or Red Hat, and - apparently - why the company did not buy JBoss.

Pictures of the Ball State Wireless 'sculpture'. popeguilty writes "Slashdot readers may recall the story about the Wireless 'Sculpture' at Ball State University. The artwork is up and running, and I've got a few pictures posted for general consumption."

Comments

Space is the Place

[Doc Ruby]

According to TFA, positrons cost $25B:g to produce, though they project the cost will decrease with more R&D (more money). The Mars mission needs 10mg. The amount of energy, not dollars, required to produce the antimatter is not specified, but it's certainly larger than the amount that winds up in the produced antimatter. The antimatter will be produced at the Earth's surface, submerged in our atmosphere, where it can annihilate in contact with any of that matter it comes in contact with.

This is a perfect project to perform in space. The base lab should be on the Moon, using the vast incoming solar energy for power, lasered past the far side to power the reactor creating the antimatter. The antimatter industry is anticipating a large scale anyway, which justifies launching whatever equipment and personnel to the Moon is necessary. That should be small, because the Moon is made of materials useable for the project, including that abundant energy. And the minimization of risk of catastrophic antimatter "pollution" on (in) Earth is priceless. The launch of a new chapter in human industry in space, with specific immediate benefits including environmental protection and energy freedom, can transform our entire society for the better.

Re:Denying Jerry Falwell's appeal

[Anonymous Coward]

"Is yet another example of constant persecution of Christians in the United States by the atheist, socialist left-wing types that currently govern our country. GOD BLESS AMERICA!!"

Err... so the Republican Party are atheist, socialist left-wing types?

I hope I never meet any *real* right-wingers then!

Re:ssh donation

[Geekboy(Wizard)]

$10k from marketing is just as green as $10k from eng. besides, the ceo knows and approves it.

Why the fuck would a gay person

[Anonymous Coward]

want to be part of christianity? It's alike a black guy wanting to join the KKK (we've all seen Chapelles bit, no need to repeat it).

Re:Why the fuck would a gay person

[Spy der Mann]

Why TF would a gay person want to be part of christianity?

Religion is chosen. Homosexuality is not. And only the looniest christian churches condemn people just because "they're gay" and try to threaten them with hell to convert.

An example of a homosexual christian is this guy.

Re:Why the fuck would a gay person

[glaucopis]

Why the fuck would a gay person want to be part of christianity?

Why would a straight person want to be part of Christianity? Maybe they grew up in a church, maybe they married into it, maybe they're raising kids and want to give them a certain moral frame of reference, maybe they like the networking opportunities, maybe they like its social missions, maybe they're just in it for a good choir, maybe they're new to an area and want the sense of community, maybe they're sick and want the hope and support that a church can provide. Or they might have experienced the whole born again thing. But Christianity has a pretty wide spectrum, and there's any number of reasons why someone might want to be a member of a church regardless of their orientation.

Not all Christian churches go for the abomination business. But even in those denominations, growing up in a church community is pretty significant -- those people are your friends and neighbors and, to some extent, your second family. Provided you still believe in the church's overall values, that community is not something you're going to throw away lightly, even if they condemn one aspect of your life.

Re:Why the fuck would a gay person

[LordLucless]

Religion is chosen. Homosexuality is not.

That's a nice assertion. Any argument to back it up? Not everyone accepts that as a given.

Re:Why the fuck would a gay person

[LordLucless]

People mean different things when they say homosexual. You see to be saying homosexuality is the attraction to members of the sane sex. The definition most often used by churchs is sexual acts between members of the same sex.

I can see why someone who is a homosexual by the first definition would want to be a Christian. It's no different from someone who has a tendancy towards alchoholism, or gambling, or heterosexual infidelity. But that's very different from the homosexual who engages in sexual acts with other members of the same sex, and (this is the important part) sees nothing wrong with that and doesn't want to change.

Maybe the situation where I live is different to the US. But over here, most Christians would not have a problem with someone who has homosexual tendancies but doesn't act on them, or someone with a homosexual past who has left it behind being a part of their church.

That's where the choice comes in. You can have homosexual tendancies, just the same as you can have alchoholic tendancies, or a weakness for gambling, etc. The choice is in whether you succumb to that temptation or not. I wouldn't call someone had homosexual tendancies, but didn't have homosexual sex a homosexual, any more than I'd call someone who had an urge to drink, but never did, an alchoholic.

But if you ask someone if they think homosexuals should be allowed in the church, they are probably going to think you're asking "Do you think people who approve of and engage in homosexual sex should be considered faithful Christians?". And the answer to that is easy. The Bible clearly states that homosexual acts are wrong. If your faith is one that adheres to the Bible, then clearly homosexuality is not compatible with your faith.

Of course, arguments over whether or not the Bible is correct in it's claims that homosexual acts are immoral is a whole other can of worms.

Re:Why the fuck would a gay person

[VE3MTM]

I don't normally feed trolls, but here goes.

The justification Christian churches use when they declare homosexuality to be a sin is from Leviticus 18:22, "You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination". Sounds fair. That means Homosexuality is bad, doesn't it?

Well, what about Leviticus 21:5, "They shall not make baldness upon their head, neither shall they shave off the corner of their beard, nor make any cuttings in their flesh"? That means shaving is a sin. Similarly, other passages from this book prohibit tattoos, eating of shellfish and pork, clothes made of more than one fabric, and other common activities.

Since these other passages are commonly ignored by Christians out of convenience, all a gay Christian has to do is ignore one more, 18:22, and they're in the clear. It's extremely hypocritical for Christian churches to pick and choose parts of this book to obey or disobey. If you're going to consider Leviticus holy, abide by the whole thing. If you're going to ignore it, ignore the whole damned book. You can't have it both ways.

Re:Why the fuck would a gay person

[VE3MTM]

Oh, yeah, don't get me started on people who say, "how can you have morals when you don't believe in God?" :)

If the only reason you act morally is the threat of supernatural fury and eternal damnation, then you are not a moral person. A truly moral person is one who behaves ethically for entirely internal reasons. External reasons, such as threat of punishment, etc. are not a good basis for a moral code.

Re:Why the fuck would a gay person

[L33TNeMiSiS]

Believe me dudes, christians have allot of problems with homosextuality, christians that dont, havent done their homework and read their bibles. Just to take your example. Leviticus was a book written to one of the 12 tribes. This tribe was dedicated to serve God in the 'temple' area. Thus this book in the bible is written to them. To show them the lifestyle God expects of them and to line out their duties in the 'temple'. That is why in this book you will get things like, not shaving, one color clothing and a indepth look in how this tribe must live, because in that time they were the ones that had to act as the person between God and his people. But to get back to the point of Homosextuality. One of the major stories of the old testament is (and you might have heard of this), is Sodom and Gremora. In this storyline the very reason for both these cities bieng destroyed is homosextuality, that is how much it angered God, that he wiped both cities. So for any christian to say. Christianity promotes Homosextuality, is a lie and these people say so because of what they want not what their bible teaches. Sorry if my English is rusty it's not my Home language.

Re:Why the fuck would a gay person

[DrXym]

The problem is that you can't pick and choose what you want to follow. There is no maybe about it. If the bible says do something you do it, or you're disobeying the word of god. It's all or nothing affair even if it means performing multiple nonsense and possibly contradictory practices at once. If the bible says no shaving of beards then it's no shaving of beards or you are not following the word of god. No ifs or buts.

For the Falwells of the world to focus on one thing and ignore the others exposes them for the venomous bigots and hypocrites that they are. The bible is merely a crutch to support their own deep seated intolerance.

Re:Why the fuck would a gay person

[gkhan1]

Also, if you look at the ancient greeks, they had no divine imperative to be moral or ethical beings (the only divine sin was hubris, and there was no heaven or hell, all went to Hades), yet they had one of the most sophisticated rule of law and government in ancient times, really only rivaled by post-enlightenment western societies. Hell, Aristotle wrote the damn book on Ethics (literally)!

Stop saying that the judicial system is derived from the ten commandments. That's crap, and nothing else.

Re:Why the fuck would a gay person

[jc42]

Not all Christian churches go for the abomination business.

Indeed. Here in the US, the UU (Unitarian-Universalist) and UCC (United Church of Christ) are both openly welcoming to and supportive of homosexuals. Many American Episcopal (i.e., Anglican) churches are also gay-friendly, though the official policy may not make much of a big deal of this, so if you like Catholic-style ritual, this might be the church for you.

At the other extreme, some Christian sects have been openly hostile to even "straight" sex. They often use Paul's comment in his first letter to the Corinthians (7:9), "But if they have not continency, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn. (ASV)" This passage is often interpreted to say that a true Christian would lead a celibate life; only the weak ones give in to sexual desires.

Taken to the obvious extreme, this had led to some sects (such as the Shakers) dying out because they didn't have children to indoctrinate and they weren't able to attract enough converts to keep the church going. OTOH, some monastic orders have lasted quite a long time despite an official ban on all sex.

It's fairly clear that with Christianity, you can pick your church based on its policies, and you can find a fairly wide range of policies. With the UUs, you don't even have to accept the whole package of beliefs, though you might not be too happy there if you don't accept their basic doctrine of tolerance of diversity.

Re:I know this will be an unpopular position...

[Steve B]

but really, how is this "fallwell.com" site any different from any other "cyber-misspelling" trap sites?

Er, because actual "cyber-misspelling" trap sites don't have disclaimers in bold red lettering right at the top of the page with a link to the correctly-spelled site?

Re:ssh donation

[techno-vampire]

For-profit companies don't donate out of alturism.

If nothing else, there's always the deduction for charitable donations they get on their taxes.

Respect for RMS

[wall0159]

I know it's kinda cool to be oh-so-cynical and mock Stallman, but he's really an incredibly important person. Sure, he's a stickler for details, and I'm not sure I'd want him at a dinner party - but we really need people like him. They can remind us of the potential consequences of decisions - consequences that we are typically *very* bad at predicting.

I think this issue is similar to trade-unions. Sure, they can be corrupt (and full of nepotism), but criticising the _concept_ based on the _implementation_ is crazy. People died fighting for workers rights, and now we are notchalently throwing them away.

Similarly (though not to quite the same extreme) people have sacrificed lots of time to produce free (libre) software tools for everybody. Yes, it's an idealistic goal. Yes, Stallman is an idealist, and can be a PITA. But freedom is lost incrementally. Just look at Naz...

Oops! Almost did a Godwin! ;-)

Anyway Ritchie, I've got a lot of respect for you - please keep being a stickler on our behalf! :-)

Cheers.

Re:Respect for RMS

[techno-vampire]

Just look at Naz...

That's a strange way to write "the Soviet Union."

Falwell??

[eclectro]

Why wasn't the guy who owned PETA.org (people eating tasty animals) allowed to keep his domain? Mr. Falwell, you have bad attorneys that don't know how to railroad the little guy. I'd ask for your money back.

Re:Falwell??

[Darby]

Why wasn't the guy who owned PETA.org (people eating tasty animals) allowed to keep his domain?

Because Jerry Fallwell is a hate mongering bigot who likes to tell people how to live their lives and PETA is...uhhh....

Hmmmm, good question.

Agreed...

[cloricus]

Movements always need a strong leader or they fail. In the free software group it is a god send to have one or two (or three) people that, while people don't always agree with/die listening to via boredom, toe a very specific and non changing line; they provide focus and direction. So for all of the horror of hardcore idealist dullness and jokes I will happily lay on RMS (and the like) I still hold a great deal of respect for him and as a member of the movement roughly follow his guidance on issues. ...Keep being that stickler for all of our sakes.

DRM haters are idiots

[Anonymous Coward]

DRM is not evil. It's a technology.

Encryption keeps information secret, the very thing stallman is against, yet GnuPG is an official GNU project.

With encryption you only get on or off. They either have access to your encrypted information, or they don't. You either trust them, or you don't.

DRM simply adds different layers of trust, more than just the two that you have with encryption. You can have partial or full trust with DRM. You only get two options with plain old encryption.

Just because it's being used for evil doesn't mean the technology itself is evil. By that logic weapons are evil too. If there were no weapons, we wouldn't in turn need them for defense, right? "No DRM" is the only choice? I don't think so. Everyone has secrets, and they have a right to keep them and trust them with whomever they want. DRM gives you that ability. Encryption does not.

Re:DRM haters are idiots

[LordLucless]

DRM is not like this. DRM basically says everyone is a criminal and you will have to play by a very restrictive set of rules.

You're talking about a particular type of DRM, albeit the only type in real use today. But DRM has the ability to do much more than that. For instance, a corporation locking sensitive documents so they can only be accessed from work to stop those "take-home work" leaks. Or you locking an email so it can only be read by the recipient, not forwarded on to everyone they know. Or to lock a document so that it can be read but not cut-and-pasted. Of course, there's always the analog hole in these sort of cases (people can just read the document and type it in again, word-for-word) but it's much better than what we have now. Of course, the key to all this is that you, the owner of the content gets to decide what controls to put on it.

I would be all for DRM - it has lots of good uses - if we could simply issue a law that said content sold cannot be DRMed. The problem with current DRM is that the person managing the rights is not the owner. They have sold the content to you. You have a right to the content - to watch it, to resell it, even to duplicate it - just not to distribute it. Content vendors should not be able to sell you content, and still retain the control over the content. It should be all, or nothing. Either that, or they can rent it. I'd have no trouble with duplication-prevention DRM on rented content.

Re:DRM haters are idiots

[Bushido Hacks]

If DRM adds trust and the industry does not trust us, then why should we trust the people who create DRM?

"If they don't trust you, why should you trust them?"

WTF?

[ratboy666]

DRM is not evil. It is JUST a technology.

Sure, its a technology. It uses crypto, but...

Lets go back to basics. Crypto means A wants to send a message to B, and C is not allowed to read it. A, B, and C are different. A and B can share keys (say, using RSA).

No problems.

DRM means A wants to send a message to B, and B is not allowed to read it. Really. This is NOT a typo.

How to do this? B is given information by A, locked into hardware, that B doesn't have access to. Really. This is NOT a typo.

Go figure. A doesn't trust B, and yet B is the receiver of the message. A wants to control B at a level that B has no say over.

It may only be a technology, but *I* don't want to deal with a paranoid like A. And, if I buy something, I want to use it for MY benefit, and not have it reserved for someone elses.

Ratboy.

Re:Proton-Antiproton Anihilation

[m50d]

So the situation with antiprotons is slightly more complex than the article suggests, and the stated reasoning for preferring positrons overly simplistic.

You seem to be just showing off here. Whatever the details of the reaction, if the end result inncludes uncontrollable high energy gamma rays, it's pretty useless for propelling astronauts.