While this may be useful, it will die a horrible death; too much information at a high-level and not enough depth. Someone seems to be taking snapshots of CSPAN and associating these with names. Really, a person shouldn't be added unless quite an initial file can be made for them, such as name, associations, etc. Just their name and picture isn't a good start and will only serve to hurt the process.
This needs to be more like open source "meritocracies", where anyone can send stuff to a "patch-list" but only committers who have proven themselves get access to change the database. Any other mechanism will be flooded by garbage.
This won't solve a thing. If you open up the channels, then a bidding process occurs... and in the bidding process, without limits, the same company will buy all of the channels.
The point is that radio can serve public needs (getting local issues, various viewpoints, various local signers, etc.) rather than purely corporate desires.
That he is even *comparing* Microsoft, a corporation with Billions in market capitalization, and millions of dollars in the bank with a loose-group of dirty hackers who don't even bother to shower is funny in itself.
Microsoft is so powerful that other companies arn't a threat... its only threat comes from a non-corporation. Ask any economist or financial avisor that this would happen about 5 years ago and they would have bet the farm against you...
But given wealth differences between the average population and the elite, the elite will get genetic engineered babys well before the total population will get better health care, shelter, food, etc.
Along time ago RMS decided to fight proprietary software by introducing the GPL and free software and the Free Software Foundation. The FSF provided a great service, it was one-stop-shopping for GPL'd software. Anything you downloaded from the FSF is safe, free of imperial entanglements.
What we need is an new music format with several parts to it; the first part specifies the license for the file (in particular the creative commons license number), the second part is a digtal signature of some authoratative source, perhaps the CreativeCommons can do this, and the third part is the music itself.
If the CreativeCommons or some other authority could start digitally signing content which is 'free' then we will be well on our way to eliminating the RIAA and providing a justification for peer-to-peer browsers.
you do have the right to speek freely... However... You did just shoot your mouth off about your employer in a negative way...
This is problematic on several fronts. First, this was an acedemic institution project which had its funding withdrawn... if it was done for political reasons, i.e., beacuse of what one of the researchers said, then it is definately, clearly, a violation of free speech. If he was awarded the grant based on the acedemic merits, and the money was canceled due to his political opinions, then this is quiet ugly.
Second, DARPA is not a private enterprise. It is an agent of the government, and an instrument of the people. While a private enterprise may be free to act anyway they want (subject to lots of restrictions _if_ they are publicly owned), the government isn't. It's bound by the constituion.
Thirdly, this is especially important for acedemic researchers, since they are in a trusted position. If publicly funded researchers have to watch what they say or their funding will dissappear... then you have effectively silenced a great majority of them. It is very much a violation of free speech.
Free speech means not only that the government won't throw you in jail, it means that it won't treat you differently from others based on your political viewpoints.
I'd give the Major-General's Speach a D
on
Updates on War in Iraq
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
The British fellow's speech was by far better. As typical American talk, it echo's a Top-Gun style theme: "We are the Best - to be Feared and Respected". It doesn't say *anything* about RESPECTING THEM and not waving our flag on their homeland.
My Score... D... for not understanding the political environment surrounding their involvement. If this is typical attitude of our US forces, then this so-called 'Liberation' will be a disaster. P.S. I give Bush an E. No where in his speach did he talk about "Humility" and "Respect" for the peoples of Iraq.
The important thing you left out, is if you steal a few million dollars or more you are into a second category of "velvet" criminals, and they on average spent 1 day in prison for every hundred thousand dollars. Don't believe me? Mr. Taubman of Sotheby's stole 43.8 million and he was only sentanced to 364 days, err, that's about $117,808 per day. Not a bad deal. I'd spend a year in a very-low security posh prison for 43.8 million, wouldn't you?
I'd look at it this way; you broke into the house to steal a TV, but on your way out you slipped into the china cupboard and accidently broke a Han Dynasty era vace worth 1.2 million. Just beacuse you got away with a $350 dollar TV didn't mean that 1.2 million dollars in damages wern't done.
If the hacker had access to the web page, he could have had access to all kinds of things and since it's hard to track what exactly transpired; you *have* to assume the worst. This means informing all of your customers (a big hit + liability), having them cancel their credit cards (time/money), and doing a full audit to make sure that nothing else changed. So, a small web defacement is very expensive from the company's perspective.
Property crime is a crime, and it should be, but the danger posted to others by these crimes is usually minimal.
I'm sorry but flushing the retirement of thousands of people and turning 10-20 years of loyalty into vapor just as a family is trying to send their children to college is anything but minimal. People suffer alot when they find out that their house is going to be collected due to "property" crime; some even have heart attacks and die.
The primary difference beween white collar crime and "violent" crime is that the former involves lots of money, and this money can be used to influence politicians so that those who do it are not punished appropriately.
The other difference is that "white collar" crime affects hundreds or thousands or even more... while violent crime usually only affects a handfull.
Ok. So it looks like the GPL forbids you to distribute GPL code if you have accepted a patent license which covers the given code.
This doesn't answer the question I posed though; does the license protect the oss developer so that they cannot be sued by the patent holder, or by a customer sued by the patent holder for patent fees required for use of the software.
Of course, if the OSS developer is using the code themselves... then they may be a target of the patent holder; but I'm referring to the case where a third party downloads the code and starts to use it; is the developer protected so that that user and/or the patent holder can't sue the OSS developer?
OSS should never rely upon patented... code, other wise it is not truly open source.
You missed what I was saying...
What happens if you code something up, start distributing it, and then happen to find out later on that the PTO filed a patent *before* you published your code that happens to cover your code?
In that case, can your users sue *you* for having distributed patented code? Should you pay for their licenses? If you knew that you could potentially be liable would you release your code under OSS?
Bull. Microsoft's legal division is probably larger than most law firms. And since when do you have to be a law firm to break a promise.
*If* they had made representations to customers that they need not license patents from Timeline, then Microsoft should be responsible, *but* I really doubt Microsoft did so in a way that can be proven in a court of law. Also, it doens't follow that a promise to one customer is a promise to all customers. So, it is possible Microsoft could be liable to a handful of customers which were made that promise, but no other customers. IANAL
I hope not. Beacuse if they are responsible for patent violations of their software by users then open source developers are going to be in for a world of hurt.
THEY infringed on the patent by selling it ouside of the agreed scope!
I'm sorry, but distributing code which violates a patent should definately not be infringing behavior; but IANAL. If it is, that is the nail in the OSS coffin. Now, if Microsoft explicltily claims that they will indemnify their users for patent violations... this is a different issue; but I very much doubt that Microsoft made any representations to this.
God help OSS developers if Microsoft is responsible. The PTO is who is responsible... for most likely (given their track record) allowing a bull-shit patent to go through.
And this is from a *confirmed* ANTI-MICROSOFT junkie, not one of your astro-turfers...
If these companies can sue Microsoft for distributing code which is burdened by patents; and if they win what does this do about OSS licenses? Does it matter if the developer knows a given peice of software violates a patent? We'd all stop making OSS software if we were liable for retroatively paying patent licensing fees for users to operate the software we contribute to.
In particular, the BSD license doesn't say anything about patents, should it have a clause like:
THIS SOFTWARE MAY BE COVERED BY PATENTS
AND THUS MAY NOT BE USEABLE WITHOUT
APPROPRIATE LICENSING BY THE OWNERS OF
THOSE PATENTS; THIS LICENSE IS NOT A
GRANT OF PATENT AND THE DEVELOPER
EXPLICITLY DENIES ANY RESPONSIBILITY
FOR PATENT LICENSING REQUIRED TO USE
THIS SOFTWARE.
Just wondering? How do other licenses handle it? Is there a clause in the GPL for this?
According to the article, it's the editors of the science journals that wat to censor their content. Not the government or some other organization wanting to censor it for them.
Dr. Trmj,
We are pleased to receive your application for your new bio-whatever-mechanism. Furthermore, your astounding background and prior research is something we all look up to. Clearly you are our first choice for funding this year. Unforunately, due to your publication history, in particular your lack of self-censorship on issues deemed critial to national security, we are unable to move your grant proposal beyond technical approval. Sincerely, NIH
Oh no. We don't censor what you write, we just sopport those who censor as we wish.
Just between you and me, of course; if you don't volunteer to publish your articles in a journal which supports this sort of meausre perhaps you may find your funding... err... dry up? Just a suggestion, we arn't quite sure how the new measure will affect future NIH funding, but you never know how administrations may change their perspective on things, especially retroactively.
science editors want to censor their publications Let'em. As far as they don't censor mine it's all right
Since compilers/assemblers can be used to make computer virusus, we should censor those too. Of course, those who present a legitimate use for such tools can always register themselves. In this way we make sure that compilers and assemblers, tools to break into sensitive computer systems, remain out of the hands of terrorists.
It's a rule. Commercial success and non-Open-Source-itude are considered evil
Your argument is just plain stupid. I'm an open source Zelot, yet I have a commercial company that makes money. The rallying-cry of open source people is that software copyright should not be used to generate "monopoly" situations where innovation and consumer options are stifled.
Furthermore, just beacuse we are pro-Google now doesn't mean that they can't become evil 10 years from now. If they abuse the power they get, and try to concentrate further power, then they may very well become an "evil empire" and chastized quite appropriately.
The core problem here is that the "ideal" state for a company is a "monopoly". Yet, monopolies are the cancer of a free commercial marketplace. In the same way human biology works this way, we want to live as long as possible; yet, when a group of cells achieves immorality (a condition we call a cancer) they become dangerous to the body as a whole. At first glance it seems strange, but really it is a *ballence* which we require. A company can be commercially successful without being a monopoly, and this is the overall ideal state of the system; lots of successful, but competing companies.
ultimately, the quality of the product matters.
You are forgetting two crucial factors.
First, you neglect that how the product is made is an essential (yet invisible) quality of the product itself. If I pollute the environment or abuse the marketplace via monopoly rents then this "damage" to society may very well trump the "quality of the product". If I take advantage of children in slave labor to make shoes, then no matter how good the shoes are... the company that made them is "evil" without a doubt.
Secondly, in our domain, the primary value of software is not intrinsic, instead it is proporational to the number of people who have adoped the software; the value of Microsoft Windows is much more proporational to the third-party applications that run on it rather than the code base itself, in a similar way the primary value of Microsoft Office is the number of business associates who also use the software, who can assist your usage of the software and who can read your files. Don't confuse the "network effect" with the value of the network itself. VHS was worse technology than Betamax, but VHS won for a single reason -- it had a better distribution channel for the tapes, in other words, the value of VHS was the movies that it can play, not necessarly how well VHS plays those movies.
The world isn't white and black, it's a mixture of greys.
Slashdot Mirror
While this may be useful, it will die a horrible death; too much information at a high-level and not enough depth. Someone seems to be taking snapshots of CSPAN and associating these with names. Really, a person shouldn't be added unless quite an initial file can be made for them, such as name, associations, etc. Just their name and picture isn't a good start and will only serve to hurt the process.
This needs to be more like open source "meritocracies", where anyone can send stuff to a "patch-list" but only committers who have proven themselves get access to change the database. Any other mechanism will be flooded by garbage.
but they really arn't good for moving masses of people.
This won't solve a thing. If you open up the channels, then a bidding process occurs... and in the bidding process, without limits, the same company will buy all of the channels.
The point is that radio can serve public needs (getting local issues, various viewpoints, various local signers, etc.) rather than purely corporate desires.
I have friends who have installed it.... I refuse to put it on my box due to Java's nasty licensing
does Greg 'groggy' Lehey come off as a bit of a prick?
I've had many interactions with groggy, and he has been nothing but very professional and helpful.
That he is even *comparing* Microsoft, a corporation with Billions in market capitalization, and millions of dollars in the bank with a loose-group of dirty hackers who don't even bother to shower is funny in itself.
Microsoft is so powerful that other companies arn't a threat... its only threat comes from a non-corporation. Ask any economist or financial avisor that this would happen about 5 years ago and they would have bet the farm against you...
But given wealth differences between the average population and the elite, the elite will get genetic engineered babys well before the total population will get better health care, shelter, food, etc.
Along time ago RMS decided to fight proprietary software by introducing the GPL and free software and the Free Software Foundation. The FSF provided a great service, it was one-stop-shopping for GPL'd software. Anything you downloaded from the FSF is safe, free of imperial entanglements.
What we need is an new music format with several parts to it; the first part specifies the license for the file (in particular the creative commons license number), the second part is a digtal signature of some authoratative source, perhaps the CreativeCommons can do this, and the third part is the music itself.
If the CreativeCommons or some other authority could start digitally signing content which is 'free' then we will be well on our way to eliminating the RIAA and providing a justification for peer-to-peer browsers.
you do have the right to speek freely ... However... You did just shoot your mouth off about your employer in a negative way...
This is problematic on several fronts. First, this was an acedemic institution project which had its funding withdrawn... if it was done for political reasons, i.e., beacuse of what one of the researchers said, then it is definately, clearly, a violation of free speech. If he was awarded the grant based on the acedemic merits, and the money was canceled due to his political opinions, then this is quiet ugly.
Second, DARPA is not a private enterprise. It is an agent of the government, and an instrument of the people. While a private enterprise may be free to act anyway they want (subject to lots of restrictions _if_ they are publicly owned), the government isn't. It's bound by the constituion.
Thirdly, this is especially important for acedemic researchers, since they are in a trusted position. If publicly funded researchers have to watch what they say or their funding will dissappear... then you have effectively silenced a great majority of them. It is very much a violation of free speech.
Free speech means not only that the government won't throw you in jail, it means that it won't treat you differently from others based on your political viewpoints.
The British fellow's speech was by far better. As typical American talk, it echo's a Top-Gun style theme: "We are the Best - to be Feared and Respected". It doesn't say *anything* about RESPECTING THEM and not waving our flag on their homeland.
... for not understanding the political environment surrounding their involvement. If this is typical attitude of our US forces, then this so-called 'Liberation' will be a disaster. P.S. I give Bush an E. No where in his speach did he talk about "Humility" and "Respect" for the peoples of Iraq.
My Score... D
The important thing you left out, is if you steal a few million dollars or more you are into a second category of "velvet" criminals, and they on average spent 1 day in prison for every hundred thousand dollars. Don't believe me? Mr. Taubman of Sotheby's stole 43.8 million and he was only sentanced to 364 days, err, that's about $117,808 per day. Not a bad deal. I'd spend a year in a very-low security posh prison for 43.8 million, wouldn't you?
Oh yes, he actually didn't actually give me advice... he just kinda kept quiet and let me figure it out for myself....
Code, by Charles Petzold is what I'd give my 12 year old self. At that time 1984, my dad gave me the C Programming Language, the Unix Programming Environmnet, and a new computer loaded with a copy of Microsoft's XENIX operating system.
I'd look at it this way; you broke into the house to steal a TV, but on your way out you slipped into the china cupboard and accidently broke a Han Dynasty era vace worth 1.2 million. Just beacuse you got away with a $350 dollar TV didn't mean that 1.2 million dollars in damages wern't done.
If the hacker had access to the web page, he could have had access to all kinds of things and since it's hard to track what exactly transpired; you *have* to assume the worst. This means informing all of your customers (a big hit + liability), having them cancel their credit cards (time/money), and doing a full audit to make sure that nothing else changed.
So, a small web defacement is very expensive from the company's perspective.
Property crime is a crime, and it should be, but the danger posted to others by these crimes is usually minimal.
I'm sorry but flushing the retirement of thousands of people and turning 10-20 years of loyalty into vapor just as a family is trying to send their children to college is anything but minimal. People suffer alot when they find out that their house is going to be collected due to "property" crime; some even have heart attacks and die.
The primary difference beween white collar crime and "violent" crime is that the former involves lots of money, and this money can be used to influence politicians so that those who do it are not punished appropriately.
The other difference is that "white collar" crime affects hundreds or thousands or even more... while violent crime usually only affects a handfull.
Ok. So it looks like the GPL forbids you to distribute GPL code if you have accepted a patent license which covers the given code.
This doesn't answer the question I posed though; does the license protect the oss developer so that they cannot be sued by the patent holder, or by a customer sued by the patent holder for patent fees required for use of the software.
Of course, if the OSS developer is using the code themselves... then they may be a target of the patent holder; but I'm referring to the case where a third party downloads the code and starts to use it; is the developer protected so that that user and/or the patent holder can't sue the OSS developer?
OSS should never rely upon patented ... code, other wise it is not truly open source.
You missed what I was saying...
What happens if you code something up, start distributing it, and then happen to find out later on that the PTO filed a patent *before* you published your code that happens to cover your code?
In that case, can your users sue *you* for having distributed patented code? Should you pay for their licenses? If you knew that you could potentially be liable would you release your code under OSS?
Microsoft is not a law firm
Bull. Microsoft's legal division is probably larger than most law firms. And since when do you have to be a law firm to break a promise.
*If* they had made representations to customers that they need not license patents from Timeline, then Microsoft should be responsible, *but* I really doubt Microsoft did so in a way that can be proven in a court of law. Also, it doens't follow that a promise to one customer is a promise to all customers. So, it is possible Microsoft could be liable to a handful of customers which were made that promise, but no other customers. IANAL
Microsoft should be responsible...
I hope not. Beacuse if they are responsible for patent violations of their software by users then open source developers are going to be in for a world of hurt.
THEY infringed on the patent by selling it ouside of the agreed scope!
I'm sorry, but distributing code which violates a patent should definately not be infringing behavior; but IANAL. If it is, that is the nail in the OSS coffin. Now, if Microsoft explicltily claims that they will indemnify their users for patent violations... this is a different issue; but I very much doubt that Microsoft made any representations to this.
God help OSS developers if Microsoft is responsible. The PTO is who is responsible... for most likely (given their track record) allowing a bull-shit patent to go through.
And this is from a *confirmed* ANTI-MICROSOFT junkie, not one of your astro-turfers...
If these companies can sue Microsoft for distributing code which is burdened by patents; and if they win what does this do about OSS licenses? Does it matter if the developer knows a given peice of software violates a patent? We'd all stop making OSS software if we were liable for retroatively paying patent licensing fees for users to operate the software we contribute to.
In particular, the BSD license doesn't say anything about patents, should it have a clause like:
THIS SOFTWARE MAY BE COVERED BY PATENTS
AND THUS MAY NOT BE USEABLE WITHOUT
APPROPRIATE LICENSING BY THE OWNERS OF
THOSE PATENTS; THIS LICENSE IS NOT A
GRANT OF PATENT AND THE DEVELOPER
EXPLICITLY DENIES ANY RESPONSIBILITY
FOR PATENT LICENSING REQUIRED TO USE
THIS SOFTWARE.
Just wondering? How do other licenses handle it? Is there a clause in the GPL for this?
According to the article, it's the editors of the science journals that wat to censor their content. Not the government or some other organization wanting to censor it for them.
Dr. Trmj,
We are pleased to receive your application for your new bio-whatever-mechanism. Furthermore, your astounding background and prior research is something we all look up to. Clearly you are our first choice for funding this year. Unforunately, due to your publication history, in particular your lack of self-censorship on issues deemed critial to national security, we are unable to move your grant proposal beyond technical approval. Sincerely, NIH
Oh no. We don't censor what you write, we just sopport those who censor as we wish.
This is a voluntary measure
Just between you and me, of course; if you don't volunteer to publish your articles in a journal which supports this sort of meausre perhaps you may find your funding... err... dry up? Just a suggestion, we arn't quite sure how the new measure will affect future NIH funding, but you never know how administrations may change their perspective on things, especially retroactively.
science editors want to censor their publications
Let'em. As far as they don't censor mine it's all right
Since compilers/assemblers can be used to make computer virusus, we should censor those too. Of course, those who present a legitimate use for such tools can always register themselves. In this way we make sure that compilers and assemblers, tools to break into sensitive computer systems, remain out of the hands of terrorists.
It's a rule. Commercial success and non-Open-Source-itude are considered evil
Your argument is just plain stupid. I'm an open source Zelot, yet I have a commercial company that makes money. The rallying-cry of open source people is that software copyright should not be used to generate "monopoly" situations where innovation and consumer options are stifled.
Furthermore, just beacuse we are pro-Google now doesn't mean that they can't become evil 10 years from now. If they abuse the power they get, and try to concentrate further power, then they may very well become an "evil empire" and chastized quite appropriately.
The core problem here is that the "ideal" state for a company is a "monopoly". Yet, monopolies are the cancer of a free commercial marketplace. In the same way human biology works this way, we want to live as long as possible; yet, when a group of cells achieves immorality (a condition we call a cancer) they become dangerous to the body as a whole. At first glance it seems strange, but really it is a *ballence* which we require. A company can be commercially successful without being a monopoly, and this is the overall ideal state of the system; lots of successful, but competing companies.
ultimately, the quality of the product matters.
You are forgetting two crucial factors.
First, you neglect that how the product is made is an essential (yet invisible) quality of the product itself. If I pollute the environment or abuse the marketplace via monopoly rents then this "damage" to society may very well trump the "quality of the product". If I take advantage of children in slave labor to make shoes, then no matter how good the shoes are... the company that made them is "evil" without a doubt.
Secondly, in our domain, the primary value of software is not intrinsic, instead it is proporational to the number of people who have adoped the software; the value of Microsoft Windows is much more proporational to the third-party applications that run on it rather than the code base itself, in a similar way the primary value of Microsoft Office is the number of business associates who also use the software, who can assist your usage of the software and who can read your files. Don't confuse the "network effect" with the value of the network itself. VHS was worse technology than Betamax, but VHS won for a single reason -- it had a better distribution channel for the tapes, in other words, the value of VHS was the movies that it can play, not necessarly how well VHS plays those movies.
The world isn't white and black, it's a mixture of greys.
Err, I'm not sure, but I think "i" before "e" is a rule for English only.