MS probably does have a few valid patents in this case, but it's not about what patents MS has. This is about the fact that MS refuses to tell anyone which patents they are referring to thus making it impossible for the infringing code to be removed.
Saying that Microsoft's claims are invalid and thus no one should worry is 100% wrong. A resolution to this problem needs to be forced quickly, the situation can't remain as it is now because it has already hurt Linux companies and the community itself.
Either MS needs to be sued or they need to reveal the patents in question, but they can't just be ignored.
I think he was trying to make the point that the situation could be reversed if MS used GPL code, but that would be a copyright issue not a patent issue since in that case the object is actual code.
He was also trying to say that the idea of suing users of a particular piece of code is ridiculous and could be easily turned around on MS if they used (unlicensed) patented methods in their code, something no one can check on.
I can't say this strongly enough, there NEEDS to be proprietary codec and format support in Linux. The right course of action is to make the real versions available and work on FOSS implementations at the same time. We can't pretend that the world and everyone in it using Linux are going to pause until everything can be replaced with FOSS software, there must be a middle ground that includes real versions of Flash, Real media, Windows Media, Quicktime, etc. So far Adobe and Real have done very well supporting Linux, and people can choose to use those things if they want to.
That doesn't mean we should stop developing FOSS implementations like Gnash or libavcodec, it just means we need to be realistic and provide support for things should people choose to use them, especially when proprietary versions are the only real option due to stability and compatibility with the format in question.
CNR seems more like a front end to me, it just happens to include the ability to buy commercial software as well, thats the basic difference.
Something Ubuntu needs though, is the ability for users to browse to a website, say, the Ubuntu wiki, and click a single link to install software. Novell just got done introducing something like this and its a good thing to have.
For instance, instead of writing out 2 pages of "heres how you install this package, open a terminal, blah blah" they can simply click a provided link to install the package and all its requirements.
I do like the fact that we have Ubuntu around, but make no mistake Ubuntu is very bare at the moment and lacks a lot of things.
Except it never should have been locked in the first place. It's very obvious that Apple locked it to AT&T so they could receive even more profit from their new device without having to take any real risk.
Your "tampering" is simply the market reversing Apples obsession for control.
Subsidy is when the price DROPS, not when it stays the same because Apple found another way to guarantee excessive profits. In other words, subsidy has nothing to do with Apples ability to make profit, and the cost of the iPhone is BELOW sale price, not above.
boo hoo, go buy something commercial if you need something for your obviously enterprise level active directory. Or you could just use LUKS, you know the full disk (including root) encryption system thats part of most linux distros already....
Or, use bitlocker. I fail to see what your problem is, other than being mad at truecrypt for no valid reason.
If you knew what you were talking about you would have known that opensuse 10.3 doesn't even have ZMD, not turned on, not included by default, not installed.
Besides that.exe files are PE executables, wine uses them just fine, so does mono. Do you refain from using Wine out of some fear of PE executables? DO you even know what a PE executable is?
The difference is in the license used, not in beliefs. If you want to ensure you get all the changes to your code back, don't use BSD licenses. It's that simple.
Nice idea, perhaps we should force everyone to buy a certificate from Verisign, and force all ISP routers to check certificates on each piece of mail at each hop....
I wonder if something like that could be abused........
It would be one thing if Apple agreed not to screw with unlocked phones, but they won't do that and you know it. They spent quite a bit of time working on this system, they are going to protect it.
Also remember this is a DRM system being circumvented in place, these people are USING the phone as-is with another carrier, not installing Linux on it.
What will actually happen is GCC will get forked at GPLv2, if the majority of people are behind the v2 fork the v3 version will become irrelevant.
I do like the fact that we will (hopefully) have 2 good compilers, but people aren't going to simply start licensing things under BSD just because of GPLv3, they will just keep using GPLv2 because they were using GPL for a reason.
Slashdot Mirror
MS probably does have a few valid patents in this case, but it's not about what patents MS has. This is about the fact that MS refuses to tell anyone which patents they are referring to thus making it impossible for the infringing code to be removed.
Saying that Microsoft's claims are invalid and thus no one should worry is 100% wrong. A resolution to this problem needs to be forced quickly, the situation can't remain as it is now because it has already hurt Linux companies and the community itself.
Either MS needs to be sued or they need to reveal the patents in question, but they can't just be ignored.
I think he was trying to make the point that the situation could be reversed if MS used GPL code, but that would be a copyright issue not a patent issue since in that case the object is actual code.
He was also trying to say that the idea of suing users of a particular piece of code is ridiculous and could be easily turned around on MS if they used (unlicensed) patented methods in their code, something no one can check on.
I think you took the word "erasing" too literally.
I can't say this strongly enough, there NEEDS to be proprietary codec and format support in Linux. The right course of action is to make the real versions available and work on FOSS implementations at the same time. We can't pretend that the world and everyone in it using Linux are going to pause until everything can be replaced with FOSS software, there must be a middle ground that includes real versions of Flash, Real media, Windows Media, Quicktime, etc. So far Adobe and Real have done very well supporting Linux, and people can choose to use those things if they want to.
That doesn't mean we should stop developing FOSS implementations like Gnash or libavcodec, it just means we need to be realistic and provide support for things should people choose to use them, especially when proprietary versions are the only real option due to stability and compatibility with the format in question.
CNR seems more like a front end to me, it just happens to include the ability to buy commercial software as well, thats the basic difference.
Something Ubuntu needs though, is the ability for users to browse to a website, say, the Ubuntu wiki, and click a single link to install software. Novell just got done introducing something like this and its a good thing to have.
For instance, instead of writing out 2 pages of "heres how you install this package, open a terminal, blah blah" they can simply click a provided link to install the package and all its requirements.
I do like the fact that we have Ubuntu around, but make no mistake Ubuntu is very bare at the moment and lacks a lot of things.
With the new Slashpot3000 its more of a Xooooosh sound
Except it never should have been locked in the first place. It's very obvious that Apple locked it to AT&T so they could receive even more profit from their new device without having to take any real risk.
Your "tampering" is simply the market reversing Apples obsession for control.
Subsidy is when the price DROPS, not when it stays the same because Apple found another way to guarantee excessive profits. In other words, subsidy has nothing to do with Apples ability to make profit, and the cost of the iPhone is BELOW sale price, not above.
boo hoo, go buy something commercial if you need something for your obviously enterprise level active directory. Or you could just use LUKS, you know the full disk (including root) encryption system thats part of most linux distros already....
Or, use bitlocker. I fail to see what your problem is, other than being mad at truecrypt for no valid reason.
No
Anything else? You could have just turned off ZMD like the rest of us did, its not even included anymore.
And by the way, the software manager and updater work perfectly now.
If you knew what you were talking about you would have known that opensuse 10.3 doesn't even have ZMD, not turned on, not included by default, not installed.
.exe files are PE executables, wine uses them just fine, so does mono. Do you refain from using Wine out of some fear of PE executables? DO you even know what a PE executable is?
Besides that
Viewing a video probably equals using software in that case.
Xorg was a fork OF XFree86, not a duplicate project.
Duplicated effort = bad
Forks = good
So your argument boils down to "Well......we don't want your changes anyway! so there!"
Yea, that works perfectly.
The difference is in the license used, not in beliefs. If you want to ensure you get all the changes to your code back, don't use BSD licenses. It's that simple.
Nice idea, perhaps we should force everyone to buy a certificate from Verisign, and force all ISP routers to check certificates on each piece of mail at each hop....
I wonder if something like that could be abused........
BSD isn't actually closed....i hope you realize the difference.
Restricting competition is almost never a good idea.
It's not nonsense, its completely true, you just suggested an additional reason for them to dislike GCC.
Don't pretend like they DON'T hate the GPL, they have been actively replacing GPL code in their trees for a long time for exactly that reason.
I would be interested to know what architecture that the BSDs find important has been dropped from GCC, and why that is such a huge problem.
Hot cash injection.......sounds dirty
"There's zero precedent for awarding profits to an author who made a willing and intentional donation to the public domain"
Your post should have stopped there, because this has nothing to do with public domain.
In fact, firefox2 by default only downloads a list and checks locally, which seems to have escaped everyone involved in this "Story".
Firefox2 already does that, you can set it to download a list periodically.
Now please forward that information to....everyone else in this thread.
Thx
It would be one thing if Apple agreed not to screw with unlocked phones, but they won't do that and you know it. They spent quite a bit of time working on this system, they are going to protect it.
Also remember this is a DRM system being circumvented in place, these people are USING the phone as-is with another carrier, not installing Linux on it.
Because Microsoft has some hits in the face coming to it.
Its like when you steal the teachers chalk......
Microsoft is getting spanked in public.
What will actually happen is GCC will get forked at GPLv2, if the majority of people are behind the v2 fork the v3 version will become irrelevant.
I do like the fact that we will (hopefully) have 2 good compilers, but people aren't going to simply start licensing things under BSD just because of GPLv3, they will just keep using GPLv2 because they were using GPL for a reason.