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What 2008 May Hold In Store for FOSS
eldavojohn writes to mention that LinuxPlanet has a brief discussion on what 2008 may hold for FOSS. The list includes thoughts on KDE 4, OOXML, DRM, and 3-D desktops. What boons for FOSS are you looking forward to in 2008?
That's what I'd like, a version of bash implemented in opengl, so I can make the console apps I write look funky.
Not perhaps the highest priority of the FOSS world, but sometimes you just gotta go with 'it`d be fun'.
A Linux port of Duke Nukem Forever, now that we finally know it isn't just vaporware...
I've been hearing about this "free beer" with FOSS for years... maybe in 2008 we'll finally get some?
KDE4 is half of what I want.
The other half is FreeBSD 7. Given it is on RC1 now, it'll be there in Feb is my guess.
Self proclaimed typo king, and inventor of the bear destroying coffee table (patent not pending).
who put 3d desktops on the list? what a waste of cpu time.
This comment is fully compliant with RFC 527.
I'm thinking many would not consider DRM in FOSS to be a boon of any sort...
GNU/HURD
I wanna see Linux turn into "the platform" for AI. I read something about it already becoming that so that'd be sweet. Right now you all know the famous categories. Windows is for business and other dumb stuff. Macs are apparently the thing to get for video and graphics work though I strongly disagree. And Linux is gonna be for anything with AI! Cuz AI programmers (and their programs) are smart enough to know that paying for an OS is stupid when you don't have to and you can't change much about the OS after you install it. And you don't need your AI creation freezing up while the OS makes a system restore point or crashing randomly (OS X and Windows). And in 2009 I hope a giant pengiun robot attacks Microsoft headquarters.
Google's Super Secret Search Algorithm: SELECT @search_results FROM internet WHERE @search_results = 'good'
"Then we'll see if Java can become a major challenger to .NET and Mono."
Huh?
Mostly, a waste of GPU time. But seriously, the expose-ripoff with window title search that compiz has is highly productive when you open lots of windows. Other stuff, pretty much eye candy to me, but I admit I don't try every thing or understand functional benefits some features I relegated to eye candy. There are ways to make use of rendering live to GL manipulated textures that I'm sure will increase (Vista I didn't see make functional use of it, OSX did better, and with all the many different directions people are taking 3D effects in compiz and other projects in the open-source world, some interesting stuff is probably yet to come.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
and I for one welcome our new FOSS overlords.
I hope to see more home entertainment devices driven by linux, especially in the world of digital television as analog is phased out. For instance, right now I'm receiving free over-the-air digital television by using a linux-based digital-to-analog conversion box from the now defunct US Digital. I'm keeping a close watch as Feb. 2008 approaches to see what develops on my blog - http://williambryson.blogspot.com/.
I really REALLY mean it this time!
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
Or that virtualization, which was such a hot topic in 2006, would have settled down to just another technology?
I disagree, in fact I'm seeing more interest in the topic. I've poked around on various forums and there are quite a few number of people who see Virtualization as a good alternative to dual-booting (unless you have to play 3D games). The latest edition of VirtualBox runs quite nicely (on my Sempron 3400+ and 1GB RAM) and is easy to set up. I recommend it to anyone who's interested.
Actually, I'm hoping for Linux ports of ANY commercial games. I've mailed a few game distributors asking why don't they include Linux versions of their games. The same answer: Not enough market share (and how do you expect the market share if the game publishers don't make Linux games? HMPH!)
Why do they keep selling themselves to DirectX instead of OpenGL? GRRRR!
The end of the tyranny of copyright law. Only then will there be true progress. Otherwise, this and everything else will be buried under the dog pile of licensing, which has already begun.
What?
What a great article on what 2008 MAY NOT hold for FOSS.
Keep those meaningless headlines coming for the new year.
In what way are these predictions?
The article lists known points of debate or unfinished business from this year. Its the equivalent of a persistence weather forecast i.e. tomorrow will be the same as today.
Might as well have stuck 'a year in review' as the title instead.
bash *could* support opening an OpenGL screen to display a 3D model paper clip to help you enter commands...
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
And while I'm at it, hopefully improved compatibility due to the Samba team finally getting the proper documentation from Microsoft.
I'm among those who would be happy if existing apps could get fixed, Firefox being the prime example. On my G4 Mac every new realease of FF brings more crashes, more memory leaks, and generally more sluggish performance. I finally abandoned it last month for Opera, which I am liking very much.
When most Open Source apps were small, simple and fast I could tolerate the inevitable bugs, and assume that they would be fixed up in the next release. Now it feels like everyone is working to add more and more features and "widgets," but no-one is worrying about overall stability and reliability.
Three Squirrels
Yes! Thank you New Year's Gods! A native linux driver for my Aspire laptop's Broadcom BCM94318MPG card!
Yes sir. I really can't ask for more than that can I?.. The old BCM94318 w/out any damned NDIS wrapper.
Yep. It sure would take a warm and good soul to release one of those.
Or rather, a beginning to the reformation of copyright law, as copyright is necessary. The GPL is a copyright license, for example. Or let's say I wrote a novel - I would be pissed to see it on sale as with my name crossed out and "iminplaya" pencilled in instead.
So why are so many of these crystal gazing, horiscope reading, entrail of toad prognostications showing up on slashdot?
Well, to quote the much maligned Christian Bible (2 Peter chapter 2):
And to quote myself (Happy nude year!):
And to quote myself again: "The future is now. The future is bunk."
While we're doing this, a letter from prison rings in the new year.
Here's hoping 2008 sees you healthy and happy, and that Linda gets out of prison. I miss her.
-mcgrew
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
That would be plagiarism, something else entirely. Copyright is about distribution, not about who created what. GPL is only necessary due to the existence of copyright law, as pointed many times by many others. Slavery is still slavery. It cannot be "reformed". It must be abolished. And remember to throw some royalties into the RIAA kitty if you plan on singing Aud Lang Syne tonight.
What?
That's all I ask.
You are being MICROattacked, from various angles, in a SOFT manner.
Okay, so you'd feel okay about printing 100,000 copies of my novel and selling them and not giving me anything for them? That seems silly.
How is the existence of the GPL only necessary because of copyright? I don't get it. If I write some code and I want it to stay open, because it is attributable to me, I use the GPL. How would abolishing copyright keep my code open? Am I missing something obvious here?
I'd like to see some organization standards. Like for my Mp3's things should go seamlessly between amarok, rythembox, etc and photos, and movies. I think FOSS is really behind Apple in this area.
I am looking forward to JADE, a roguelike, successor of ADOM.
http://www.adom.de/
+1 Martyr
There are 2 types of people in this world. Those who understand ternary and those who don't.
They want to port to HURD first.
I also understand that some of the more recent portions are written in Perl 6.....
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
I predict that LLVM and HLVM will gain steam. People are going to realize that this pair of abstractions is cleaner, leaner, and meaner than the current virtual machine + language + API way of doing things characterized by Java and .NET. The fact that a GPU can be used as a processor transparently where appropriate, just the way Apple already has with LLVM, is going to start the rethink that was cut short by Java and .NET's fiascoes of ownership or patents. They'll also start making development in compiled languages easier.
This will be the open source response to the blurring lines between CPU and GPU task-wise, as the vector computing tasks could be done much quicker on the GPU based on the advances of LLVM, and applications will benefit transparently. It will be very cool.
2008 is the year OpenChange completely re-writes the groupware scene and allows OL2K7 to connect to a linux server and TB to connect to Exchange 2K7
:-)
WOW
Also in the headlines:
Dell gives us the triple boot PC - XP + Ubuntu + OSX
(That's what we *really* want)
Landrover's build quality reaches perfection
HP realise that the extra 2p for a recovery CD will help sell PCs
Orange will shoot the idiot who skins their phones
Gumstix will start to feel LARGE
oh yeah, And World Peace.
klik2 !
You probably got modded because it was a crazy ass sounding rant against trying to predict tech trends by using religion. You then followed up with a bunch of offtopic tripe.
Tech website speculating about the future of FOSS in the next year.... yeah... it happens. That's great that no one will remember who predicted what. That's not the point of the exercise. The point is to discuss it NOW for the heck of it. It most likely has nothing to do with hating religion.
I'll believe in corporations having personhood when Texas executes one... - advocate_one
ReactOS will probably hit .4 in 2008. The roadmap lists that as improving the already great kernel compatibility, usable networking, basic audio support, and USB interface device support. If you want to break Microsoft's dominance on the desktop, this is where to look, not Linux.
Former US House candidate, TN-5
Naw, just annoyed nerd. A real martyr would be bleeding and in pain, not just annoyed. I'm not bothered by any lack of karma, mine's excellent and remains there. Few days go by that I don't have several "interesting" or "informative" or whatnot (even though I usually go for the karma-free "funny".).
Any time you mention religion at slashdot you're likely to be modded straight to moderation hell. Maybe they thought the linked journals are tolls? Maybe I just don't get it, I live in a strange town, halfway between St Louis and Chicago, where half the baseball fans cheer the Cardinals and the other half cheer the Cubs (nobody cheers the White Sox. Nobody but Alan anyway). In Springfield's bars you can talk about sex, religion, politics, without fear of altercation but talk baseball and you're likely to be in deep shit with somebody.
Someone's sig here says there is no "-1 I don't agree with you and troll, flamebait and offtopic are not valid substitutes." I couldn't agree more with the fellow.
Someone (or a lot of someones maybe) has mod points that should not be moderating. Some AC (not me, I don't post AC. Even if I'm not logged in I'll add my name to the post) got modded "offtopic" in the Mars thread probably because he had the utter gall to beat someone to "first post". And the guy's comment was not only on topic, but interesting and informative.
I wish that mods had modders' names attached. It's pretty cowardly to attack someone anonymously as todays mods are doing. probably some Microsoft lawyers with mod points. Or SCO lawyers. If they're not the same guys...
(remembers to check "no karma bonus" box as this comment really is offtopic)
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
From the article: "And it is true that food and clothing may seem like more immediate priorities in many regions."
Please do not send any more clothes. You've already killed off the local textile industry and put all the cotton farmers out of work with your free clothes. Who can compete with free crap? Please stop.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/1076411.stm
I no longer donate clothes for exactly this reason.
Is OOXML not already an ECMA standard??
The only possible interpretation of any research whatever in the 'social sciences' is: some do, some don't
Well, that's been the prediction the last ten years, might as well be consistent.
I'd like to see an "infinite desktop" with a head mounted display and orientation sensor. I can turn my head and see many virtual feet of documents in every direction. I can use my mouse to slide my point of view right or left. To me this would be a useful model and could eventually be adapted to portable use on planes and such.
Who said anything about selling them? I'm only talking about the exclusivity of distribution. Without that sales is not an issue. You will make money when somebody asks you to produce more of what they like. That's how it works for me, and most everybody else.
GPL? Public domain will insure it stays open and distributable. That doesn't stop you from attaching your name as the creator. In that manner copyright can be useful as a registrar of such things. GPL was created to prevent "normal" copyright from closing it and possibly prevent you from using your own creation. That is something that the present system allows if the other guy files first. Listen, there are many people who say it more eloquently than I can. Feel free to look them up.
What?
Too often the tyranny of copyright law means simply that the Geek can't safely download a screener of a movie that won't see theatrical release for six weeks.
There are other players than xmms...
Though I suppose when you have 3D, spinning spectrum analyzers, things are looking pretty good.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Copyright is like everythign else a social construct designed to make it easier for someone to profit from that they do. If you want something to complain about then complain about absurd patent laws as those are infinitely more harmful, there is by definition no GPL for patents (ie: you can write a gpl version of windows from scratch but if it's patented then even independent implementations infringe).
As for abolishign copyrights, why do you care? Well? If you think the GPL is so great then it shouldn't matter, after all society will naturally move towards it since it's better. And remember to throw some royalties into the RIAA kitty if you plan on singing Aud Lang Syne tonight. Why would you sing that, if you believe in a lack of copyrights you should do just that. Don't listen to anything but truly free (ie: GPL) music or you're a hypocrite. If you illegally download music for example then you're simpyl admitting that GPL is failing in the area of music.
Thx, just curious. They seem to be doiung it to a lot of folks today though, there were a couple of fellows who made on-topic, humorous observations in another post who was modded "offtopic".
A lot of folks see any mention of religion at all and automatically think "oh this must be a troll".
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
Story Tagged: yearofnextyearistheyearofthelinuxdesktop
Love sees no species.
Just reiterating what the other poster said. In the normal world, you get paid for the work you do, not the work of your work. If I hire Bob to come build me a gate, he doesn't get to charge me every time someone comes through it. He is paid to build the gate and then he gets the hell out of my life. He only gets paid again if I need him to return and do more work.
Same with the novel (or insert song, program, etc in here). You might have (and without copyright likely would have) been paid to write the story in the first place. Once you've been paid to write, you write the novel. Now, you can choose to only give it (or you could technically sell it) to the people who already gave you money, but the bottom line is you will have already been paid to write it. Once it's done your part is done and if people want to make copies of it to sell, or to give away, that's their own concern. If you want to keep raking in cash you better have written a story good enough that people are willing to pay you to write another one. And you better be willing to write a number of "sample" stories to begin with if you want anybody to start reading your stuff.
With music, it's even easier. You could in the same way be paid to write the songs, or more likely you would be paid for live performances (ie, you are actually gonna have to get out there and do work again).
With software, GPL isn't needed because if you release a closed source version of my code I'm just gonna decompile it, reimplement the changes in a high level language, and rerelease it again. If you want to be paid for software, someone will end up hiring you to do a custom program for them (ie, you must work, not live off imagined entitlement), or you can write free stuff and charge to support it (again, working).
You also have to understand that not EVERYTHING will/would be feasible with copyright gone. It's a shift of society, but for the better. I'm sure if we reinstituted slavery we could achieve some absolutely marvelous feats in construction and such, but that doesn't mean it's something that a fair society should support. I seriously doubt large scale motion pictures as they currently stand would still be realistically profitable (though live theater certainly might return to a much more profitable status). That's not something we can't live without though, and it's certainly not worth instituting insanely oppressive laws over.Copyright instills a limited supply (and source) onto something that by nature is unlimited (and not really even tangible). It's one of the most perverted corruption of economics ever seen.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
Look at http://scan.coverity.com/. This is a great project to improve the stability of open source projects by looking for all sorts of coding errors that can be very hard to spot manually. It may not be true that with enough eyeballs, all bugs are shallow. But is it very clear that the Coverity eyeballs are exceptionally good at exposing lots of bug. It is all clear that the open source developers are excellent at fixing these bugs. If KDE can get 4.0 out the door and drive their Coverity defects closer to zero, then I think that we will see a very robust, efficient KDE 4.0 by year's end. The number of defects in my Linux/X.org/KDE 'desktop stack' has dramatically dropped, at least as measured by Coverity. Sorry for sounding like an advertisement. I know that there are other ways to find defects, but I am just so impressed with how open source developers have closed thousands of coding errors that have been identified by these automated code audits. This is the sorts of constant improvement that quietly leads to better stability and security.
Think global, act loco
Well, your approach to novels is certainly...novel. I can't see it working though, as there is no incentive to write books essentially for free (you don't get paid ahead of time for writing one).
As for the code example...decompile it and reimplement?? That is the most hilarious thing I've heard all day. Have you ever written software? So some company takes Asterisk, closes it, and adds a bunch of stuff. I'm going to decompile it and figure out what they did? Are you daft?
The "write free stuff, get paid for support" model works in certain limited cases only, normally enterprise stuff. How would it work for games, for example?
I really get the feeling you guys have never actually created anything of value, particularly GPL'd software.
More cowbell.
Nerd rage is the funniest rage.
Since DRM is just security through obscurity, and the open-source aspect kills all obscurity, you're not any worse off with FOSS DRM schemes than you were without. If anything, I would use FOSS DRM as an asinine excuse to legitimize the sharing of copyrighted materials in real-time using a sort of library lending style DRM scheme. I have a truly marvelous proof of this proposition, the scope of which this post is too narrow to contain.
For it to go from a cool academic project to a mainstream compiler I think GCC (or rather Tree-SSA) will have to die, since they compete for developers, and I just don't see it happening ... especially not now that Stallman has retracted his objection to exposing the necessary data for intermodule optimization (which was one of the main advantages of LLVM and also the main obstacle for it being adopted instead of Tree-SSA).
Unfortunately the situation with GCC just isn't as dire as in the EGCS era.
It would make life simpler if OpenJava and Mono were merged into one platform that retained the APIs from both platforms so libraries could be written for the merged platform and accessed from any language using the One Platform.
Software Inventor
I'd like either a nice port of iTunes or to find a better jukebox-type music player. I know I can get 100 suggestions right now for players people swear by, but nothing I've tried so far handles browsing, selection, and playback of music as well. In fact, I'd like a better version of iTunes, with features like the ability to classify a song as multiple genres, and have it show up under each.
I've yet to try setting my Linux box up as a iTunes library sharing server (which makes sense with the Macs in the house but the media on my Linux desktop), but if that's not easy to maintain (adding/editing content) I'd like to see improvement there. I suppose that falls into the network media sharing server that's compatible with iTunes as a client category.
Also, the traditional complaint about having to fiddle around. Why should I have to assign keystrokes to 8 of my 12 mouse buttons for it to work across everything (comfiz-fusion/kde, wine/wow, fluxbox, etc)?
OK, I just got Linux running on the last box in the house, a 266 Mhz P2 with only 128 Mb of RAM. I had to dig up a copy of Stormlinux from 2000 to find something that would run on that old box, but there it is, all 7 machines are on Linux. So, 2007 is the year of Linux on the desktop and you all can stop worrying. Those of you who predicted it now have six hours (if you're in EST) to brag about getting it right (more for those on the west coast). After that, shut up, please?
Who is John Cabal?
I agree with you entirely, but I'd just point out that the GPL doesn't really apply to music. A good analog in these situations would be Creative Commons. I especially agree with the last paragraph; if you want to fuck the RIAA, the best way is to avoid it entirely. Piracy is counterproductive.
I write bullshit
Funny, most novelists don't.
how to invest, a novice's guide
Our own little metavid wiki project also coming along
2008 should see millions of people playing back ogg theora videos in their browsers. While its not going to replace flash anytime soon it will begin to show up in many free software CMSs and begin to break down one of the last proprietary technologies in the web platform.
I for one can't wait for Truecrypt 5.0. Scheduled for release in January of 2008, the new version will contain (I believe) the first FOSS implementation of full hard drive encryption (pre-boot authentication and everything(Windows)), as well as a very good encrypted container solution that will work on Windows/Linux/MacOSX.
IKVM.NET
Have you ever written, say a book or magazine article, for publication? Without copyrights a publisher could take what you wrote and sell it as their own without paying anything for it. Sure you could try to publish yourself but even with today's technology it's still expensive. Try printing just 10,000 copies of a book and distribute it. Vanity publishers can charge you a few dollars a copy, but then you still have to do the marketing yourself. Or you can to print it yourself. At 10 cents a page, for black and white, a 200 page book would cost you $20.
The one thing I would do about copyright law is I'd shorten the copyright term, the length copyrights last. Instead of the life +70 or whatever term, I'd only have them last a few years from first publication. Of course any derivative work would also get a few years.
FalconShould there be a Law?
...in all its glory.
How is the existence of the GPL only necessary because of copyright? I don't get it. If I write some code and I want it to stay open, because it is attributable to me, I use the GPL. How would abolishing copyright keep my code open? Am I missing something obvious here?
The GPL uses and depends on copyrights, that's what copyleft is about. Without copyrights the GPL means nothing, it allows a person to use GPL code and make modifications to the code. But if the code is distributed the source has to be as well. Copyright laws are responsible for this, as if someone distributing GPL software who doesn't make the source available can be sued.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Well as for the media player portion of your question I think Amarok fields your needs.
You are able to browse, select (multiple) files from your filesystem and have them appended onto your playlist.
You can also add files, (multiple) directories to be added into your collection for easier searching.
You can use a search such as ` genre:"classical" OR genre:"instrumental" ` to grab songs that match either criteria. This is also available through a menu off of the search bar.
OSX supports SMB for use as network storage that you can have auto mount on your mac machine, use Cmd-Shift K to bring up that menu on your mac client.
It should be simple to add/edit content if you grant your clients r/w access, the method might vary some on the server end depending on your distro.
iTunes shouldn't care about the fact that its remote, after all its just another location in the file system when you have it mounted.
Traditional or not I have no idea what that last paragraph is about, unless your trying to run 2x window managers, 2x desktop environments wine (probably with an unmanaged desktop) and wow inside that... I'm still lost.
09:F9:11:02 - 9D:74:E3:5B - D8:41:56:C5 - 63:56:88:C0
Copyright instills a limited supply (and source) onto something that by nature is unlimited
I am glad to say this is wrong. First someone has to write whatever it is, and copyrights give them an incentive to write it. Therefore copyrights are more likely to make sure something is written, and therefore increases the supply, than not having copyrights. As it is now, a writer does not have to copyright something, they can instead put whatever they create into the public domain. And how many books, movies, or songs are released into the public domain as compared to those copyrighted? I know of no such material that has been placed into the public domain but those for whom the copyright has expired. However as I said in a previous post I would shorten copyright terms, I'd only have copyrights last a few years from first publication.
FalconShould there be a Law?
That's what I meant...sorry, I obviously wasn't clear. Novelists write with the hopes of future earnings. The other guy said novelists should write because someone pays them ahead of time, but forego future earnings. As you noted, novelists don't get paid ahead of time. So the net effect is to write for free (a bit tongue in cheek, I know).
I'm looking for a new revolutionary idea.
Desktops have been essentially the same for 20 years now.
I have no idea what that idea is... I just hope someone figures out something really fundamentally cool to do with existing frameworks.
'Once scientists, even the dim-witted social scientists, get muzzled, the Western Civilization is finished.' - oldhack
*Who* will pay the songwriter this one-time lump sum that will make their efforts worthwhile? And where will this person (or group) get their money? From charging each customer a fraction of that amt originally paid to the songwriter? Sounds similar to the current situation. Or are you arguing that once a specified number of people have purchased the song (and covered the songwriter's expenses), the rest of the customers shouldn't have to pay anything?
A post a day keeps productivity at bay.
Wine has been getting very good of late (e.g. runs Photoshop 7 flawlessly, runs Office 2003 with some bugs). In fact, I see Wine's Windows-compatibility over the next few years becoming a major selling point for transitioning to Linux.
While WINE may help peoples transmission to Linux from Windows I also think it can have the disadvantage of discouraging software developers from porting their Windows software to Linux. "Why should we spend the tyme and money creating a Linux port when Linux users can run our software in WINE?" Personally I'd rather run a native Linux port of Photoshop CS3 than run Photoshop 7 in WINE.
FalconShould there be a Law?
Please do not send any more clothes. You've already killed off the local textile industry and put all the cotton farmers out of work with your free clothes. Who can compete with free crap? Please stop.
Actually it's cotton subsidies that have harmed Third World cotton farmers. What could really help them though is if instead of growing cotton, which relies on heavy applications of petrochemical inputs, farmers switched to hemp, jute, or other sources of natural fiber that don't require these inputs and are easy to grow.
FalconShould there be a Law?
I find it interesting that Slashdot's reaction to abuse of a working idea is to go with an extreme idea like abolishment. Apparently no one here is capable of following through to the logical conclusion what complete abolishment of IP would mean. e.g. privacy wouldn't exist in a digital world.* Also you'd replace one flawed system with a more draconian one. No, as the saying goes when one wishes to discern motives, one should "follow the money". That applies as much to individuals as it does corporations. What do abolishers (think) they will get out of abolishment of IP? Certainly not an endless stream of free quality content. No more than slavers expected an unlimited supply of free quality labour to work the fields. The present system works because no one is a slave (any kind of slave) to another. But can enter into reciprocal agreements with their fellows and walk away if they don't like the terms. Each trusting that the other will honor their side in both conclusions. Piracy short-circuits that and instills mistrust and disrespect the foundations of a civilized society undermined. It also hurts it's practitioners by extending to the rest of their life by making certain they can never be put in a position of trust or power over others or their possessions for anyone demonstrating their principles are so flexible just might donate your possessions to "the cause". Also if they ever change their mind and become involved in a career of "virtual property"? They'll find they've poisened the well for themselves as well as those they envy for apparently benefiting from their labours.
*No I'm not talking about the "loss of", but it simply not existing to begin with.
>> If I hire Bob to come build me a gate, he doesn't get to charge me every time someone comes through it. He is paid to build the gate and then he gets the hell out of my life. He only gets paid again if I need him to return and do more work.
That totally depends on what arrangements you made with Bob to build the gate. You could have hired Bob to build the gate and his pay is the ability to charge anyone that goes though the gate (ever hear of toll road?).
And the people walking up to the gate don't have the ability to change which agreement you made with Bob, they may get to walk through on your dime or they might have to pay him his or they can decide to not go through at all.
I blanked out the first two paragraphs in, but what you're trying to say is that you want people to pay people once to make something, and then that be the end of the money trail. Am I close to being right?
The flaw with that is that then only the interests shared by people with big bucks will get made.
The current system is the worst system ever, except for all others tried, and your hypothetical one. Work on it a bit more and I'm sure it'd be good though!
Consider yourself spoken to.
I'm anxiously awaiting FOSS to actually DO something in the cellular world. I'm about ready to learn how to write code just to help push things forward with the Neo1973 (as it is, I'd only slow it down). I can already taste full mobile access and synchronization with my google mail, contacts and calendar, asterisk sorting and routing the calls right on my cell phone, and cellular companies starting the long slide back to being just the carriers they started out as, and no longer dictating what I can do with my end-user device. Oh - and I'm really enjoying seeing the MAFIAA slowly realizing that consumers just aren't buying DRM.
I'm looking forward to a public release for songbird. Songbird is pretty much Winamp and Firefox mashed into one, and they made it work on any OS - even linux. I'm also looking forward to some of the more popular add-ons being ported from firefox (PlainOldFavorites, IETab, TabmixPlus, etc)
2008 foss will be rename floss. by changes I tell you what
When mentioning DRM in the context of FOSS, we're always, always talking about the Direct Rendering Manager, right?
Right?
"Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
How do you think corporations like IBM and Sun own copyrights? After all, corporations cannot write programs (even though they are legal persons). Programmers get hired, and what they write while they are employed belongs to the company. They got paid once, and they will not, in most cases, see any more royalties for future sale of that program. The same applies to journal, magazine, and newspaper articles. Since reporters are hired by the publisher, the copyright usually belongs to the publisher (and, again, the journalist or columnist will not see additional royalties from future publication). A novel is a special case, since most of the time, novelists are not hired by someone to write it. They are probably lucky to publish them without having to pay for the cost out of their own pocket (probably through some licensing deal with publishers).
I could go on and on, but one thing I want to emphasize is, most of the time, if someone paid you to create something that's copyrightable, the person who paid you owns the copyright, as a work-for-hire, not you. That's the law.
P.S. BTW, that's why FSF wants you to get a copyright disclaimer from your employer if you contribute to FSF projects (and they want copyright assignment to them, for more effective GPL enforcement)---your employer could potentially claim copyright on your code as work-for-hire, sometimes even if you worked on it entirely on your own time.
Last year, many people(like myself) started using CMS, since free CMS:es like Drupal and Joomla now has reached a level of usability where they save so much developing time that it can't be ignored anymore. In fact, I'd say that not using them would, in most web development projects, be irresponsible and bordering on stupid.
So I predict, that from this year and forward, it will become way harder for consulting firms to charge customers lots of money to, for the millionth time, develop the same GUI:s and content handling mechanisms that most web sites need.
An other thing is that so many of these firms so unaware of the threat they are facing, that this will come as a complete shock.
"What, did our competitor offer a same or higher level of sofistication for a TENTH of our price?".
Baboons are cute.
it just says drm will become a political issue again, not that people will be trying to sneak it into linux.
Additionally, it's misleading.
It proclaims vista's "growing userbase"(laughtrack here) represents consumer acceptance of drm, and also implies there were no ubiquitous DRM modules in win XP.
The only real difference between the two is the DRM modules in vista are utterly destroying system stability to the point everyone with a clue is advising people to "UPGRADE TO XP PRO"
VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
At the beginning was at.
I know this will never be read - one day after post, and with a starting score of 0 and all.
... trust me, I've considerred most of them. And rather than dismissing, it's smarter to think "could the problems that occurred thanks to XYZ occur all over again?")
But I hate it when people say things shouldn't be copyrighted (I appologize before hand if that was not the jist of your summary, but this is Slashdot after all). Well, I sorta hate it.
Imagine, if you will, that there exists something in this world whose supply is by nature unlimited, but which we are legally prevented from copying. And that you agree with this.
Did you come up with paper money? I did. Really, in a system of Fiat Currency, there is little intrinsic value to paper money - the value of a 1$ bill is 1$, no matter how many 1$ bills exist. The whole system is built arround the purchasing power that the money brings; if everyone wants it because that's how they trade, a 1$ bill gains purchasing power. Though a problem lies when people copy that 1$ bill.
We start with you having the only 1$ bill in existance. All the collectors want this, and you are free to set your own terms. But someone says "it isn't fair, he has a 1$ bill that I want" and copies it. All of a sudden, value has been created. There has been no theft (unlike how the law treats copyright - that, I admit is flawed); as theft implies a transfer of an item of value. Where once was a value of one 1$, now there is a value of two 1$. But, why is this illegal? And why do we agree it should be illegal?
Because it's not about intrinsic value of the item, it's about the extrinsic value, aka purchasing power. Before you were free to set whatever terms on your 1$ bill, now if you do that the counterfeiter will simply sell his for slightly less... and since he has no problem creating more... [aside: this makes the world banks the greater violators of copyright / counterfeit]
Well, it's the same damn thing with copyright. If I copy an MP3, I've created value, for the value of the file is in the music it contains. Except, since there are so many MP3's, if someone wanted to get an MP3, they'd look arround and say "well, everyone else is copying it, so should I."
And that's the real problem. With all this creation of intrinsic value, how does extrinsic value adjust? And what happens when everything has no extrinsic value? An extrinsic-value free system is a high-minded ideal, one I personally see some advantages to, but the whole damn economy is based on the assumption that what I do has some purchasing power; be it that I trade my work for currency or goods (barterring).
Given how old the barterring system is, I sure as all hell don't think we should be blindly throwing monkey wrenchs into a system which has supported society for thousands of years.
* (Feel free to point out how Shakespeare et al. are remembered through copies, or how art has always been copyable, or how it's just an analogy, or how we aren't talking about goods but Imag. Prop., or how
Actually compositing renderer are excellent when doing remote control over slow links.
/faster/ !
When using X-forwarding over SSH, your remote application is treated on screen like any other local one.
When using a classical window manager, every time you drag another window over the remote application or switch desktop or whatever similar, the windows manger sends a message to the application asking it to repaint it's window and the application sends-back again what should be visible on screen. This is network intensive and if you're working over a slow link, application spent most of their time with solid gray windows waiting to be repainted.
(You need to switch to something different like VNC).
When using a compositing windows manager, each application is rendered inside a texture buffer. No application's window content is destroyed. The manager simply compose the screen by drawing those textures. If a window is draged over another or if an application is swap in or out of screen while switching buffer, there's no need to redraw anything the complete window is already available in the texture buffer.
Thus it is a lot less network intensive
In my experience, Compiz actually make working with X-Forwarded application over a slow link much
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Read up on some John Ruskin, my friend. Commoditisation of art is not a good thing. Being an artist becomes just another job - and a massively unprofitable one, at that. In your world the company actually running the press gets everything by running off new copies ad infinitum, your novel becoming to them a gift that never stops giving (assuming of course that it's any good).
So by all means, remove copyright, and allow all the money in books/films/music to fall into the hands of middlemen. Deny artists everything. Hell, why should art be special? Why should artists do anything? Photoshop, for example - one of the most widely pirated pieces of software in the world. If Adobe cannot make money off each copy sold, what is the incentive for them to create it in the first place? Who's going to pay them?
FOSS is a hobby for most people, a job for only the lucky few. Software, music, films, books - there is little incentive to create any of these things in a copyright free world save for the personal satisfaction derived from doing so, a hobby. Most of the artists I know will say that they work on their craft not only out of personal satisfaction, but because it can pay the bills (and they always aim to create something great, because they know the rewards can be great). I think you dramatically overestimate how many people are willing to work for free. Why do something amazing when it doesn't have to be? Kick the next piece of crap out the door, the publisher pays the same. Where have all the artists gone? They're all working other jobs now, never to produce a piece of art for anyone but themselves ever again.
The only people who benefit from a forced removal of copyright are publishing middlemen and people who just want somebody else's work for free.
"If I hire Bob to come build me a gate, he doesn't get to charge me every time someone comes through it."
Argument by analogy. Always weak.
"Same with the novel (or insert song, program, etc in here). You might have (and without copyright likely would have) been paid to write the story in the first place."
Why is someone going to pay you money "in the first place"? Only if they expect to get back more than they paid you!
"Once you've been paid to write, you write the novel. Now, you can choose to only give it (or you could technically sell it) to the people who already gave you money, but the bottom line is you will have already been paid to write it."
By people expecting to get back more than they invested in you.
"Once it's done your part is done and if people want to make copies of it to sell, or to give away, that's their own concern. If you want to keep raking in cash you better have written a story good enough that people are willing to pay you to write another one."
No one is going to pay you to write a story unless they expect to make more money off it than they paid.
"And you better be willing to write a number of "sample" stories to begin with if you want anybody to start reading your stuff."
Professionals do have "samples", not for general distribution though. To interest potential backers.
"With music, it's even easier. You could in the same way be paid to write the songs, or more likely you would be paid for live performances (ie, you are actually gonna have to get out there and do work again)."
Music is not easy. Composition and performance require a high level of understanding that does not come overnight. You know what "paying dues" means? Talk to few musicians about it.
"With software, GPL isn't needed"
That's nice to know!
"because if you release a closed source version of my code I'm just gonna decompile it, reimplement the changes in a high level language, and rerelease it again."
Your code, your call.
"If you want to be paid for software, someone will end up hiring you to do a custom program for them (ie, you must work, not live off imagined entitlement)"
Only if they expect the custom program to improve their business, or expect to sell it to their competitors enough to recoup the money they spent on you.
", or you can write free stuff and charge to support it (again, working)."
Your call. But yet again, you need to understand why anyone would pay you money. Only if they expect to get back more!
"You also have to understand that not EVERYTHING will/would be feasible with copyright gone. It's a shift of society, but for the better."
Not if the artistic professionals let alone the geniuses cannot turn a profit due to freeloading. Obviously, they will cease producing their creations, except for their private amusement. Which is a shift for society but decidedly NOT for the better.
"I'm sure if we reinstituted slavery we could achieve some absolutely marvelous feats in construction and such"
I'm sure we wouldn't. Human "manpower" has long been eclipsed by construction technology.
", but that doesn't mean it's something that a fair society should support."
This old historical grievance perpetrated by people long dead and gone is absolutely irrelevent to copyright! Once again, you are arguing by analogy. Always weak, and this time, frankly ridiculous.
"I seriously doubt large scale motion pictures as they currently stand would still be realistically profitable"
Yes, and those who lost their money will not be funding any more! Too bad for those of us who enjoy such pictures.
"(though live theater certainly might return to a much more profitable status). That's not something we can't live without though"
Oh really? Any other arts out there you'd care to ditch? All of them? Very judgemental aren't you?
"and it's certainly not worth instituting insanely oppressive laws over"
If c
"What boons for FOSS are you looking forward to in 2008?"
None. I don't care about FOSS. I honestly don't care for the most part where my software comes from, as long as it does the job.
If it's free and closed, then I'll use it. If it's free and open, I'll use it. If it's commercial and reasonably priced, I'll buy it and use it.
It really is amazing how much good software is being ignored by zealots because it doesn't fit their life's philosophy. Fine for them, but I'd rather use the tools that work the best for my needs.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
What you're asking for is the death of the mass market. The chance that large fractions of the population will up front donate mini-payments for something that
1) May or may not happen because not enough pay)
2) Which they have next to no guarantees of what they're actually getting and even great companies make sucky products
3) That they'll get free copies of if others pay because someone in that mass market will let everyone copy for free
is absolutely none. It'll destroy the simplest, most direct feedback on products (product sucks => sales tank => lose money) because they've already gotten paid, now they just need to get away with it. Focus will shift entirely from delivering to throwing the best sales pitch and scams that have no intention of delivering will flourish.
In addition, you have to remember who this will hit the most. The mass market has let average consumers have a far greater influence on the market, before it was the rich and powerful that through patronage set a lot of the agenda. Common art mostly survived through amateur entertainers that probably got some patronage at the local pub, but that was also it. The result would be that you can't find 25k people throughout the world willing to pay $1 on iTunes for niche music, instead you'd have three local fans which just can't support you. If you think the world was bland before, I doubt it'll help.
In the end, what's "natural" is not really interesting. Consumer protection laws are by no means natural, but I still want them. The real question is, does it make the world a better place or not? Just screw the DRM and use restrictions and pseudo-sale licenses, sell me a copy like a book (which is "IP" as much as the rest) and I'd be happy. Screw me and I'll screw you right back.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
I'm looking forward to the end of the tyranny of copyright law. Only then will there be true progress. Otherwise, this and everything else will be buried under the dog pile of licensing, which has already begun.
I guess one thing I'd be looking forward to is a version of Teh Lunix which actually works. But every year I ask for way too much, and end up disappointed.
The tragedy is every year I ask for the same thing.
You seem to be sidestepping this question.
On the contrary, the question has been asked and answered. Without copyright, the question, and GPL become moot...nothing more than mental masturbation.
What?
What I'm advocating is the end of exclusivity. You have no exclusive right to a divulged idea (I think that's how he said it), nor to natural resources. And, by the way, the food analogy doesn't work. We can produce more than we can consume, but distribution costs are still quite high, and have to be paid for in some fashion, and it seems we would rather destroy the "surplus" to maintain the price.
Why would you sing that, if you believe in a lack of copyrights you should do just that.
I will, and I did...many times. Same goes for "Happy Birthday..." But copyright gives the cops the authority to kick your door down if the RIAA demands it, and I would rather recover from my hangover in my own warm bed, not some jail cell awaiting a "swift" trial.
I'm in an endless infinite loop
What?
Why not Amarok? Not a rhetorical question, seriously curious. I have several issues with it, but for the criteria you named (browsing, selection, and playback) I feel that it beats the pants off iTunes.
My main gripe with iTunes is that it forces you to organize your music the way it wants you to. Fuck that. I've had the same directory structure and naming and tagging system for ten years. To quote Top Gun, "The rules are not flexible, nor am I."
(If you'd rather have a GTK app, please for the love of God try gmusicbrowser. I like it more than Amarok, but I use KDE so I use Amarok. You'll thank me for this.)
Hey, I finally got my first freak! Took you long enough!