The RIAA did the same thing at my former college, and of course some people had files on the public drives or had huge ftp sites going and got in trouble.. Well.. they were indescrete, dumb. However, some people were harassed over LEGAL Mp3s. In their anti-mp3 efforts many sysadmins forget there is such a thing. In fact many songs from www.mp3.com are freely distributable. I for instance record my scanner traffic to mp3 format. This does not make me a criminal, but the RIAA puts pressure on universitys who overreact and automatically cave in.
When I first heard of DVD encryption, I jokingly made bets on how many days it would take someone to crack it. I guessed 10 days. So I was a bit off, but "I told you so." I wonder when these people will realize that all copy-protection schemes can be cracked. What they have to do is provide more than just the movie in thier "official" versions. They should learn some lesson's from Rob Young's famous Linux - Ketchup speech.:)
We have seen a number of non open-source operating systems before and after linux hit the scene, but it is the OpenSource nature of Linux which has kept people interested in the operating system. BeOS which is a cool operating system also will likely never become as popular as Linux for two reasons, 1. It ain't free: Users hate having to dish out money for updates 2. It ain't open: People are less willing to invest time developing for it. More FUD.
The robust Linux operating system however has been the sucess story that the Opensource movement has needed for a long time.
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The RIAA did the same thing at my former college, and of course some people had files on the public drives or had huge ftp sites going and got in trouble.. Well.. they were indescrete, dumb. However, some people were harassed over LEGAL Mp3s. In their anti-mp3 efforts many sysadmins forget there is such a thing. In fact many songs from www.mp3.com are freely distributable. I for instance record my scanner traffic to mp3 format. This does not make me a criminal, but the RIAA puts pressure on universitys who overreact and automatically cave in.
When I first heard of DVD encryption, I jokingly made bets on how many days it would take someone to crack it. I guessed 10 days. So I was a bit off, but "I told you so." I wonder when these people will realize that all copy-protection schemes can be cracked. What they have to do is provide more than just the movie in thier "official" versions. They should learn some lesson's from Rob Young's famous Linux - Ketchup speech. :)
We have seen a number of non open-source operating systems before and after linux hit the scene, but it is the OpenSource nature of Linux which has kept people interested in the operating system. BeOS which is a cool operating system also will likely never become as popular as Linux for two reasons, 1. It ain't free: Users hate having to dish out money for updates 2. It ain't open: People are less willing to invest time developing for it. More FUD.
The robust Linux operating system however has been the sucess story that the Opensource movement has needed for a long time.