You can write books about how to make bombs, kill people, or turn small nations into smoking holes in the ground*, but you can't actually do those things!
So you can write a book on how to de-CSS DVDs, then...
* Actually, the USA tried to do that with Viêt-Nàm 35 years ago...
The idea that source code is free speech has always been obvious to me. Think about it. I can goto Amazon.com (if we're not boycotting them) and order books on how to build and atomic bomb or emp gun or assault rifle, how to break into computers and wreak havoc, and many other worse things I'm sure.
Worse things, say, like looking at their JAVA source code for One-Click Shopping(tm)???
An anonymous reader writes,"French free Webhosting services are now not so free anymore (In French!). In fact the French National Assembly has decided that anyone wanting to host some Web pages on a server has to identify himself. If this is not done, it's the server administrator who is responsible for any contents of the pages... The immediate consequence for this is that free Web hosting services in France, like altern.org or multimania.com, won't be able to continue. "
Can't you guys read the whole thing before going ballistic???
Cette loi va à l'encontre de la legislation européenne, et de celle de tous les pays démocratiques.
This law goes against European law, and [the law] of all democratic countries.
Ce vote n'est pas definitif, une troisième et dernière lecture doit avoir lieu. Mais il va s'agir d'arrondir les angles entre le texte du sénat et de l'assemblée donc on peut craindre encore pire.
This vote is not final, a third and final reading will have to happen. But it will be to cut corners between the senate text and the National Assembly text, so we can fear even worse.
So, for the laymen, this has not happenned yet, and if it does, it will be challenged in the European court.
From : http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20000316. html
But wait, hasn't Microsoft already spent millions on the X-Box? Didn't they demonstrate it in public? Wasn't it killer? Yes, yes, and maybe. Let's take these points in reverse order. The demonstration was amazing, its true, but amazing demonstrations don't always translate into amazing products. The X in X-Box may well mean the mystery hardware upon which it ran. Microsoft admitted the demo was an X-Box simulation running on hardware different from what will actually ship in a year or two. It's easy to do a killer demo if the demo system is crammed with tens of thousands of dollars worth of digital signal processors and memory. Microsoft skirts the edge on truthfulness in these things, and the company would have no qualms about presenting the software as real even if the demonstration hardware was beyond mortal affordability.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo...
An example. When a meal is over, I like to just rinse the dishes off and put them in a dishwasher. It cleans, disinfects and dries the dishes pretty well. In short, some pretty useful functionality. I, of course, could have gone to the hardware store and bought the high pressure pumps, heating coils, enclosure and spent the next 5 Saturdays building my dishwasher, or I could go to an appliance store and buy a dishwasher for a few hundred bucks and have it delivered and installed.
Yes, but... Think of the FUN you'd have designing and building you own dishwasher!!!
You can fastforward through commercials, or if the phone rings, you can back up to where you left off.
And just how happy do you think advertisers will be about this idea?
Remember, in Sagan's* Cosmos (the novel - ain't seen the flick), a guy invents a pattern-detecting chip that can detect commercials and thus, he ruins the TV "industry" as we know it. He then goes on to invent a chip that detect political speech, but this time, his invention gets seized in the name of national security...
[...] my tivo knows what I watch, when I watched it. The service subscription knows my units serial number and my name. Putting 2 and 2 together wouldn't be that difficult. They claim this will never be an issue.
I have no problem with them using information and making a truckload of money off it. A million TiVo's are gonna generate excellent, accurate ratings someday.
In the UK most train cancellations and delays are caused by track problems and mechanical failures.
In the UK, the rail network has been privatized in a scandalous way which funnelled the money that should normally be used for track and rolling-stock maintenance into the pockets of well-placed people.
So, it is not surprising that the UK rail system is subject to delays, breakdowns, and extremely lethal accidents (sorry, we don't have money to fix that broken signal, we have to pay dividents, you know).
The British Rail privatization is a showcase to the world of why thatcherism is a scourge, and a lesson that (fortunately) stopped dead similar projects worldwide.
It is safe to say that thanks to the eye-opening experience of the british rail privatization, the people of England decided to kick out the little tory shopkeepers from the House of Parliament, and bring back commonsense to government (a State is NOT a business, and cannot be run as such).
Yawn... Old hat. Can't you slashdotters have a look at history? Otherwise, you'll be condemned at repeating it... badly.
First, a brief word about ekranoplanes (a.k.a. Wing-In-Ground effect). Here is an actual picture of such a beast in flight (Gerry Anderson fans will be delighted by this one). They have been around for almost 40 years, having been devellopped in the defunct Soviet Union. You may look at this page for historic information, as well as pictures of enormous ekranoplanes as well as the 400 ton Lun ICBM launcher. For those who worry about greenhouse gas emissions, there is also a pedal-powered WIG!!! Oh, yes, those craft are already covered by a Canadian regulation, proof that they've been around long enough to rouse the attention of regulators...
Now, about trains. Nothing really new, there either.
In the 1960's, french engineer Jean Bertin (1917-1975) pursued the développement of his ill-fated Aérotrain, which, 30 years before the recently-canned german Transrapid maglev, almost reached the realization stage (both in a commuter rail line betwen Paris and the western sububurb of Cergy, and a line between Lyon and Grenoble for the 1968 winter Olympic games). Bertin's Aérotrains ran on a single inverted T concrete rail, and used a cushion of air for sustentation. An early prototype, the Aérotrain expérimental 02 (which looks like it was inspired by this), reached the speed of 400 km/h in 1966 and 422 km/h in 1969 (not an impressive achievement, since at that time, the rail speed record was achieved in 1955, when an ordinary locomotive pulling four totally normal cars reached the speed of 331 km/h on a perfectly standard railroad line). More pictures are available here.
Bertin's Aérotrain technology almost got selected in place of the current TGV, but at the last minute, State support was withdrawn from the Société Bertin. The Aérotrain (and any other newfangled guided transportation system such as maglevs and monorails - we're in the real world, here, not in Disneyland) suffered most from gross incompatibility with existing rail lines (necessary to enter the core of cities) and an extremely heavy implementation of switches, which precludes their widespread use and thus reduces the flexibility of their rail networks.
Jean Bertin never recovered from the shock of losing State support; he died a few months later, despite having built a prosperous engineering company which still thrives in high-technologies.
Throughout the Aérotrain's history, the French National Railroads (SNCF)'s attitude was extremely interesting. Despite all the media hoopla that surrounded the Aérotrain and the political interest, it did not say anything at all. Not a single word either for or against the Aérotrain was uttered in official french railroad circles. But during that time, the SNCF worked hard at perfecting what is seen today as the epitome of high-speed travel technology, the TGV.
So, it is quite safe to say that this oldfangled flying "train" will certainly not fly very far, because the theorical speed limit of ground travel, the speed of sound, is within reach of conventionnal steel-wheel-on-steel-rail technology, which without much pain, ran at 515,3 km/h on May 18th 1990 (gee! Almost 10 years ago!!!).
(What is the speed of sound at 20C at sea level anyway???)
I still am not *completely* opposed to filtering... there are sooo many people out there whom are so terrified that their kids will *gasp* find a nude picture on the net, or they might come across something that implys that there may in fact not be a god, or whatever, and these people would not allow their children to use the internet if it weren't for this sort of option.
Then let them NOT access the Internet. Their underdeveloppment will only be the fault of their parents. So, eventually, those underdevellopped kids will be darwinly weeded-out of the universe.
Whenever we do web pages for corporations, we shall then embed dirty words in the metatags so that all the content will be censorwared, thus rendering useless browsing through censorware!!!
Not at all; when I program *MY* computer, I make the law that governs it's actions. And when it comes to lawyers/judges/police, it's the legislator (lawmakers) that make the program that govern their actions.
It's the same thing. Except that one has been around for thousands of years more than the other...
Except that software and law are fundamentally different.
False. They are the same thing. Both are rules meant to be executed precisely by dumb automaton. In one case, you have computers, and in the others, you have lawyers, judges and policemen.
I, for one, would have absolutely NO objections to an arbitrary form of languange construct that defines a law, as long as the definition made sense and was itself rigidly defined.
Hell, yes. Then, when people needed a lawyer, they'd have to hire a programmer instead. (Ka-chinggg!!)
Oh, great, so we'll have to be the butt of programmer jokes...
Make computers and their systems work so Joe Citizen can understand them...otherwise your programs are poorly written, and need to be rewritten until they are understandable/usable to the layman. Even the admins who are there to help you don't know how the software works until they're told by tech support. Go to your local computer store and ask them to appraise you of all new upgrades released this year so you can stay up to date. They'll laugh you out of the office.
In this regard, it's perhaps worth pointing out that some of the greatest works of classical music would be considered "stolen" by today's definition of intellectual property, borrowing themes, ideas, and whole passages from previous works. The same is true of many great works of literature.
Ha! Look at Walt Disney who made most of it's wealth on ripping-off old fairy tales (Cinderella... Snow White... Mulan).
Or listen to the (excellent) cartoon music penned by Carl Stalling (Looney Tunes / Merrie Melodies); an encyclopedic well-timed patchwork of old European classical music.
Now, just TRY to fairly use either of those abovementionned products, and see the robed hordes divebomb you with subpoenas...
Is Slashdot going mainstream??? I mean, going like mainstream media : addicted to sensationalist story that look so until you read the actual story??? -- "It's a ligne Maginot-in-the-sky"
Slashdot Mirror
So you can write a book on how to de-CSS DVDs, then...
* Actually, the USA tried to do that with Viêt-Nàm 35 years ago...
--
Worse things, say, like looking at their JAVA source code for One-Click Shopping (tm)???
--
Can't you guys read the whole thing before going ballistic???
So, for the laymen, this has not happenned yet, and if it does, it will be challenged in the European court.
--
--
From : http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20000316. html
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo...
--
Yes, but... Think of the FUN you'd have designing and building you own dishwasher!!!
--
Remember, in Sagan's* Cosmos (the novel - ain't seen the flick), a guy invents a pattern-detecting chip that can detect commercials and thus, he ruins the TV "industry" as we know it. He then goes on to invent a chip that detect political speech, but this time, his invention gets seized in the name of national security...
* Yes, the BHA...
--
Boy, would Nielsen kill for that!!!
--
--
--
--
Definite proof that the medium is the message!!!!
--
If you're not so lazy, why aren't you out there, banging the rocks together instead of banging your keyboard???
--
Remember that slogan: "Half the fun is getting t her e " ?
--
--
So, it is not surprising that the UK rail system is subject to delays, breakdowns, and extremely lethal accidents (sorry, we don't have money to fix that broken signal, we have to pay dividents, you know).
The British Rail privatization is a showcase to the world of why thatcherism is a scourge, and a lesson that (fortunately) stopped dead similar projects worldwide.
It is safe to say that thanks to the eye-opening experience of the british rail privatization, the people of England decided to kick out the little tory shopkeepers from the House of Parliament, and bring back commonsense to government (a State is NOT a business, and cannot be run as such).
--
Yawn... Old hat. Can't you slashdotters have a look at history? Otherwise, you'll be condemned at repeating it... badly.
First, a brief word about ekranoplanes (a.k.a. Wing-In-Ground effect). Here is an actual picture of such a beast in flight (Gerry Anderson fans will be delighted by this one). They have been around for almost 40 years, having been devellopped in the defunct Soviet Union . You may look at this page for historic information, as well as pictures of enormous ekranoplanes as well as the 400 ton Lun ICBM launcher . For those who worry about greenhouse gas emissions, there is also a pedal-powered WIG !!! Oh, yes, those craft are already covered by a Canadian regulation, proof that they've been around long enough to rouse the attention of regulators...
Now, about trains. Nothing really new, there either.
In the 1960's, french engineer Jean Bertin (1917-1975) pursued the développement of his ill-fated Aérotrain , which, 30 years before the recently-canned german Transrapid maglev, almost reached the realization stage (both in a commuter rail line betwen Paris and the western sububurb of Cergy, and a line between Lyon and Grenoble for the 1968 winter Olympic games). Bertin's Aérotrains ran on a single inverted T concrete rail, and used a cushion of air for sustentation. An early prototype, the Aérotrain expérimental 02 (which looks like it was inspired by this), reached the speed of 400 km/h in 1966 and 422 km/h in 1969 (not an impressive achievement, since at that time, the rail speed record was achieved in 1955, when an ordinary locomotive pulling four totally normal cars reached the speed of 331 km/h on a perfectly standard railroad line). More pictures are available here.
Despite that, Jean Bertin built more prototypes, and a 20 km long rail line (which still runs accross the countryside, completely abandoned) on which a much bigger "train", which ran not much faster than today's TGVs do (note that the record certificate is issued by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale , and not the Union Internationale des Chemins de Fer ...).
Bertin's Aérotrain technology almost got selected in place of the current TGV, but at the last minute, State support was withdrawn from the Société Bertin. The Aérotrain (and any other newfangled guided transportation system such as maglevs and monorails - we're in the real world, here, not in Disneyland) suffered most from gross incompatibility with existing rail lines (necessary to enter the core of cities) and an extremely heavy implementation of switches, which precludes their widespread use and thus reduces the flexibility of their rail networks.
Jean Bertin never recovered from the shock of losing State support; he died a few months later, despite having built a prosperous engineering company which still thrives in high-technologies.
Throughout the Aérotrain's history, the French National Railroads (SNCF)'s attitude was extremely interesting. Despite all the media hoopla that surrounded the Aérotrain and the political interest, it did not say anything at all. Not a single word either for or against the Aérotrain was uttered in official french railroad circles. But during that time, the SNCF worked hard at perfecting what is seen today as the epitome of high-speed travel technology, the TGV.
So, it is quite safe to say that this oldfangled flying "train" will certainly not fly very far, because the theorical speed limit of ground travel, the speed of sound, is within reach of conventionnal steel-wheel-on-steel-rail technology, which without much pain, ran at 515,3 km/h on May 18th 1990 (gee! Almost 10 years ago!!!).
(What is the speed of sound at 20C at sea level anyway???)
--
Then let them NOT access the Internet. Their underdeveloppment will only be the fault of their parents. So, eventually, those underdevellopped kids will be darwinly weeded-out of the universe.
--
--
It's the same thing. Except that one has been around for thousands of years more than the other...
--
False. They are the same thing. Both are rules meant to be executed precisely by dumb automaton. In one case, you have computers, and in the others, you have lawyers, judges and policemen.
--
Oh, great, so we'll have to be the butt of programmer jokes...
--
It sounds like Windows...
--
Ha! Look at Walt Disney who made most of it's wealth on ripping-off old fairy tales (Cinderella... Snow White... Mulan).
Or listen to the (excellent) cartoon music penned by Carl Stalling (Looney Tunes / Merrie Melodies); an encyclopedic well-timed patchwork of old European classical music.
Now, just TRY to fairly use either of those abovementionned products, and see the robed hordes divebomb you with subpoenas...
--
Is Slashdot going mainstream??? I mean, going like mainstream media : addicted to sensationalist story that look so until you read the actual story???
--
" It's a ligne Maginot-in-the-sky "