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Christian Science Monitor Putting OSS at the Helm
Jane Walker writes to tell us that the Christian Science Monitor is becoming quite the proponent of open source. The aggressive nature of OSS was a large part of what drew CIO Curtiss Edge into the fold, it seems. From the article: "But beyond the tangibles like open source code it was the community that made a convert of Edge. Behind all the open code, it was the forums and flexibility that were the driving forces he believes breeds better developers than those that toil away with proprietary code. Open source software makes developers more aggressive and more apt to go out into the communities that exist around the software to find solutions to their problems, Edge said, rather than holding on some proprietary help desk line while tech support looks up the answer."
Open Source rules.
Can I get an amen?
barack to the future?
To be fair this can happen in open source world as well (well, in the so called "commercial open source world"). But, overall, in general probability of fixing an issue quickly is higher when using open source software.
Amen!
While the Christian Science Monitor was founded by the Christian Science movement (about as far from Bible-thumping Fundamentalism as you can get), for at least the past four decades it has been a general, highly respectable news source with no religious slant.
Now instead of telling my boss that our issue has been escalated to level 2 support I can say "I won't have an answer until Elm0 in #L1nuxd00dz recovers from his caffine induced tirade about how LISP is more elegant that PERL".
People who bite the hand that feeds them usually lick the boot that kicks them
You forgot to mention the old Homestead practice of community Barn Raisings. -- Probably the nicest pre-computing analogy to Open Source.
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
when i read the Christian science monitor people glance at the title and knee jerk immediately, 'what the hell are you reading that for?'
Just in case you have not had an encounter with the CSM before, it's not some religious orientated 'intelligent theory' spouting mouth piece of the far right. It's one of the most respected newspapers around, has a league of its own reporters rather than relying on wire services like most other papers, has won many awards for fantastic journalism, often reports on cutting edge science that would make the conservative far right weep, and also often reports on stories that the rest of the press skip over for not being sexy enough.
AND, they're low on cash and have been in the red for some time, how about splashing out on a subscription?
Open-source advocates were being known as Communists (Left), and now the same group of people become Christians (Right)?
:)
I am NOT a communist, but still support OSS.
I'm not such a big Christian either, I mean, I grew up in a catholic family but I'm not a strong believer. Still, I don't like proprietary software.
I'm not leftwing (even though here in Europe right and left are somehow different than in the USA)
All in all, the real point is: what on earth has to do the OSS dispute with political, or worse, religious issues?
You can make good money out of OSS, and I'm pretty sure Jesus would have kicked out the Temple both Steve Ballmer or the Red Hat CEO
My 2 cents.
640KB of virtualized ram will be enough for everybody
I have heard (and wikipedia confirms) that at the request of the founder, there is always at least one religious article per issue. I cannot comment on the quality of their general articles (though I've heard they've done some good stuff) or the quality/tone of their mandated daily religious article, but you can't really say that they have "no religious slant" if they are, in fact, going out of their way to run at least one religious article per issue.
Nonsense. Many Eastern religions have the same concept, from Mara in Buddhism to Akuma in Shintoism.
And God Said to Noah "Thou shal build an ARK-ive so that I may have a back up copy of everything that I have created." And so, Noah made back up. He back up two of everything.
When Noah was finished and everything was backed up, GOD INSTALLED LINUX! (*angles signing "HALELUJAH!"*) As God wiped away all the JPG's of Angelina Jolie on his harddrive, God though of a brilliant idea to create a flightless black and white bird that had it's own exclusive land that would be way COOLER that Eden. (Eden was a pain in the butt to maintain anyway. Between that Adam and Eve thing, kicking them out, and the cost of Fertilzer, and letting some Iraqi people rent the place and calling it Mesopotamia). This land would be easier to maintain because everything there would be frozen.
When He was done installing the fifth disc of the Linux distro, completing setup, and running yum to install any other RPMS that were not installed on the distro discs, God said "Let there be a land of ice and snow so that my latest creation may live in harmony far away from all the other things that I have made." And so it was. He called this land "Antartica" and the creatures he created were called "penguins".
Then God reinstalled most of the files he had and told Noah "If anyone ask what happen, say there was a great flood." "But what about the uber-believers oh, Lord! The take everything literally for the they think they need You to be responsible for there lives, draw stregth from, and condem all the people they call 'science nerds'?"
And God said onto Noah "F*** those Biblethumpers! I'm tired! I'm going to go listen to some Zep* and watch the penguins." You'll probably destroy yourselves over dumb crap that is about Me but I don't want to be any part of your problems. Besides, nerds rule. Only a nerd would have the ablity to use AI and bring stuff to life."
This made Noah a little said, so to make him cheer up a bit God then stated "However, in case there is a big emergency, give Me a holler."
(*="On the eighth day, God created Led Zeplin. He grabed a beer, then he rested.")
The Rapture is NOT an exit strategy.
How about reading the damned paper before you make an ass out of yourself? Any decent scientist would.
I've got a bad attitude and karma to burn. Go ahead. Mod me down.
I certainly have noticed a large number of christians in my local Linux Users Group. Someone posted a question on the list about software for some religious purpose (hymns dissemination contrary to the wishes of the RIAA? congregation monitoring? can't remember really) and they all came out of the woodwork. I was surprised about the number of active church goers. Perhaps I am just jaundiced by boarding school forcing me to go to church, but in my "other than geek" life I know no one who goes to church!
BSD can't die now! Christians have experience bringing things back that everyone believes dead.
You say that as if communist idealism is a bad thing.
I'm guessing you're an American?
The ideals behind Communism are brilliant and worthy of striving for: From each according to their ability; for each according to their need.
They're certainly a lot better than the ideals of capitalism: I got mine and screw everyone else.
In the amount of time it took you type all of your responses, you could have gone to the CSM web site and seen whether or not they fit your preconception (er, misconception). They run a single column every day in the Op/Ed section that deals in some way with spiritual matters, and that's it. Almost every newspaper in the US runs at the very least a Bible Quote somewhere on the Op/Ed pages, and the majority of daily papers in this country do carry a religious section, even if only in the Sunday edition, so the column in the CSM isn't terribly out of place (and quite frankly, it's usually fairly nonreligious, but nonetheless it's relegated to the Op/Ed pages where biased commentary belongs).
As an athiest, I can assure you the presence of that one column doesn't somehow "taint" the rest of the newspaper. Quite frankly, the CSM is one of the best, if not THE best, newspapers currently published in the United States, in terms of objectivity, comprehensive coverage of vital issues, and reporting of straightforward facts. You will never see a front page story about Angelina Jolie's baby, or any other nonsense that most American "newspapers" cover, but you will find in-depth reporting from corners of the globe everyone else is ignoring. You'll find original coverage that doesn't rely on republishing the same tired wire reports everyone else is cribbing from, and you'll see rather penetrating journalism that should make every other newspaper's Washington bureau filled with syncophants (of both parties) hang their heads in shame.
Recursive: Adj. See Recursive.
I read CSM articles from time to time and find them reasonably well balanced.
Christians are not, in general, a bunch of intolerant anti-intellectuals.
Liberals promote tolerance, not big government and immorality.
The neo-cons smear them both.
Unless those articles are about Christian Science zealots refusing medical attention to the sick and dying.
Here's a CSM article on the Schiavo case. Judge for yourself.
Real Christians are typically well read and well thougt out individuals.
GP made no such generalization.
Liberal == Communist
An apt paraphrasal of the neo-con smear to which gp refers.
True, Real Christians are typically well read and well thougt out individuals.
"Real Christians" are typically just like everyone else. As a group, they're generally neither better nor worse read than the average.
It's official. Most of you are morons.
Yes, USA, where the ignorant (that's you) can choose not to listen to people because of a LABEL. If you were as progressive as you think you are, you might actually RTFA and find out it's not a religious publication.
Smooth you.
Exactly. For research papers the first time I read an article from their website I saw it was the Christian Science Monitor and wasnt sure about it. Then I verified the facts and realized it was the best article I had. There was a continous theme in papers I worked on, the CSM was always very well written and extremely accurate and a great resource. The name throws you at first but in reality it is a great respectable place for real journalism.
The phrase "more better" is acceptable English. suck it grammar Nazis
Odd. I see more of that on the right side of the coin, rather than the left. I guess it depends on where you are coming from. Being the registered libertarian, I have noticed that it is under republican admins that I see growing gov, growing debts (excluding poppa bush), gov. interference in our personal life, increased spying, failures with the gov, but still it grows with no responsiblility taken(9/11, columbia, challenger, katrina, etc.), invasion of other countries, worse economies, increasing corruption(treason, lies, cowardess, bribes, payoffs, possible rigged elections, clamping of witnesses (sibel edmunds)), etc.
Or perhaps we read different stats and information.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
He was talking about the *ideal* of capitalism, not the reality. The ideal is most definitely "get as much as you can and screw everyone else", in reality you usually end up helping other people in an effort to grab what you can for yourself (people need other people to get rich).
In this world nothing is certain but death, taxes and flawed car analogies.