The correlation is simple: BPA correlates to cans of soda consumed which correlates to high fructose corn syrup ingested which correlates to obesity. It's not that BPA causes obesity, it's that it's in the same delivery system as the cause of obesity:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM
For me thinking becomes defective in several ways.
The first way thinking can be defective is when thinking about evaluating a boolean statement and incorrectly applying the rules of logic to evaluate the statement. Here's an example:
pancreatic cancer if left untreated leads to death.
Sooner or later everyone dies.
?!?!
Therefore if someone dies it must have been from pancreatic cancer.
The first 2 statements are true statements about the human condition. The third is a fallacious deduction made by incorrect application of logic. The most you could say logically without additional data is that "if someone dies it may have been from pancreatic cancer."
Another way that thinking can become defective is situations involving the reality of the universe in which an individual rejects valid observational data that contradicts their assumptions about the universe.
To give you an example of defective thinking consider individuals whose religious beliefs require them to believe that the universe is no older than a few thousand years old, that the world was created in 7 days, that every word in the bible is both divinely inspired, literal, and infallible.
When such individuals are presented with fossils of species that no longer exist, that can be dated by various techniques involving radioactive decay rates to be thousands, or even millions older than the supposed creation of the earth, or when the individuals are presented with an explanation of the General theory of relativity, the gravitational red shift and its implications for how far away some objects truly are in both time and space such as billions of years light years away and billions of years ago, such individuals reject the observational data as obviously incorrect or misunderstood, because the data contradicts their religious beliefs.
That ability to hold onto assumptions about the universe in spite of the fact that valid data that contradicts those assumption is what constitutes defective thinking.
I respectfully disagree that Windows is the best. It's always been my experience that Windows is nothing more than a trap to lock people into Microsoft products, products designed as much as possible to not be compatible with open standards.
I don't know what your experience with Linux has been, but my experience has been that configuring and installing "Office" products is trivially easy with any Debian based distro, or even RedHat.
If you've seen people attempting to replicate Microsoft products using "home brew 'free' solutions that are undocumented, unreliable and impossible for another employee to figure out what is going on" then I would have to guess those people are new to linux and don't realize that almost every Linux distro comes with a package manager, a package manager that can install free and open standard office automation software that's been available for years.
I would encourage you to tell your friends to read up on Ubuntu or Linux Mint and give either either one a shot and especially practice using their package managers to see how easy it is to install software. It's really amazing how much software comes prepackaged in Debian based Linux distros.
He didn't give us Windows, he forced windows on us by having an exclusive contract with the PC vendors.
You know who Billy is really more like? He's like the rich guy in that Jodie Foster movie, "Contact" who fesses up before he dies that he didn't receive so generously from people, but instead took so generously from the people. Except, in the movie the bastard admits it. In real life BillyG hasn't. I suspect that if he's going to admit it (which no one should hold their breath waiting) he'll do it on his death bed so he can't be chewed out for the damage he's wreaked on the computing sector.
There's a reason as stated in Lustig's presentation about why eating fruits as a source of sugar is NOT bad -- it's because the fruits don't just contain fructose, they also contain fiber, a substance which among other things inhibits the absorption of fructose through the intestines, unlike the sugar/fructose that's put into candy, salad dressings, junk food in general and soda which have NO FIBER. That's something you would have picked up *HAD YOU WATCHED EITHER VIDEO*.
If it makes you feel any better, *I* appreciate you letting me know what kind of diet you are eating and the results you're getting. Based on Lustig's presentation and the South Beach diet I've managed to lose 50lbs. since September 1st just by ditching the junk food + sodas + any foods high in sugars (but with no fiber) or carbs such as potatos (which if you're not familiar are processed into sugars by the human body). I'm going to try switching to a higher fruit diet to see if I can get results similar to yours.
It's not meant to be a point of criticism, but it's not meat that's making so many American's fat -- it's fructose in the diet from table sugar and just as bad high corn fructose syrup. Here's a link to a fascinating video by Dr. Robert Lustig, an endocrinologist specializing in childhood obesity, entitled "The Bitter Truth About Sugar" that covers among other topics the biochemical process that connects fructose to creation of fat cells:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM. Checkout the history between the size of soda cans/bottles and the correlation to obesity rates in America.
If you just want the highlights from the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdMjKEncojQ
In my own personal research it's mind blowing the amount of fructose in soda vs. other food products. The amount of sugar in a low sugar whole wheat slice of bread: 1g. The amount of sugar in a 24 oz. Dr. Pepper bottle: 80g! Unholy bat guano! It's a miracle that people's pancreas don't explode from the amount of sugar consumed on a daily basis.
This difference is caused by the fact that hackers and malware programmers generally love GNU/Linux. Therefor they report the bug first, then disclose it to the public and never exploit it. For Windows bugs they do it exactly the other way around.
This is not the first time I've heard something like it, and I still don't understand it. How can all hackers and malware programmers "generally love" Linux so much that they don't attack Linux sites? Can this really be true? I don't see how, but for the sake of argument, assuming that statement is true, WHY would hackers and malware programmer loooovvvvvvvee Linux so much and not Microsoft that they protect Linux and attack Microsoft? Why?
From the Halloween documents (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween_Documents), specifically document 1 (http://www.catb.org/~esr/halloween/halloween1.html) and document 3 (http://www.catb.org/~esr/halloween/halloween3.html) ESR's analysis of how Microsoft perceives interacting with others:
To put it even more bluntly: "commodity" services and protocols are good things for customers; they promote competition and choice. Therefore, for Microsoft to win, the customer must lose.
Microsoft truly behaves as though it corporately believes that there's only a fixed pool of key ideas, most already discovered, which software designers must squabble over in zero-sum competition until the end of time. In that game, the only definition of `winning' is cornering enough goodies to guarantee you a monopoly lock.
Micorosoft is a software company (even if it's run by a marketing execs); they make money selling software.
Microsoft is an OS company; they make money selling an operating system.
Microsoft is a for profit company that sells software for their operating system. They're not in the business of supporting other operating systems (example: the recent H264 plugin for Chrome is for Windows only Chrome. Some choice!)
Microsoft encourages developers,developers,developers,developers, only so long as it improves their market share of operating systems. Any developer who competes with Microsoft software or whose product is deemed useful to Microsoft is either eliminated or assimilated (preferrably after running them into bankruptcy first -- see Spyglass and Internet Explorer -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Internet_Explorer)
From wikipedia's entry on conflict resolution (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conflict_resolution) there are 5 strategies of resolving conflict: accommodation,avoidance,collaboration,compromise,and competition. Here's the definition of competition:
assert one's viewpoint at the potential expense of another. It can be useful when achieving one's objectives outweighs one's concern for the relationship.
Here's the definition of accommodation:
surrender one's own needs and wishes to accommodate the other party.
In any negotiations with Microsoft one might assume that because Microsoft is a corporation composed of many individuals that negotiations will involved either collaboration or compromise. However, you need to keep in mind that Microsoft believes in zero sum --- in order for them to win, you have to lose. Which means that in the process of negotiations with Microsoft you'll be going through the following stages of negotiation:
Assume collaboration. You'll explain your requirements and assume they will explain theirs and you'll assume you'll find a way to satisfy both. However, this won't happen as Microsoft want to win by making you lose, so they won't accede to your suggestions.
Since you don't get everything you want you'll assume the strategy has switched to compromise, clearly you're giving some to Microsoft, and you expect them to give some concessions in return to you as a way of compromising. But, Microsoft believes in zero sum, and its strategy is competitive. Microsoft gives no concessions, only face saving rationalizations so you can convince yourself that you're getting something from them.
Whether you realize it or not, your strategy has now become accommodation. To save face, you delude yourself into believing you're an equal partner with Microsoft until it's too late.
Let's analyze the Nokia-Microsoft "deal". What has Microsoft gained?
Nokia is using Microsoft's operating system. (No Linux need apply. Die symbian, die!)
Nokia is using Microsoft's api instead of another. (No qt is allowed)
Why do people allow chairmen to make ignorant remarks like that? Friends don't let friends make asinine remarks about security without at least understanding the issues:
Kerckhoff's Principle.
It was a well written, respectful, explanation excusing Mr. Gates' behavior by rationalizing that everybody's money in some way or another funds "bad" things in life. I, however, don't agree nor do I accept any attempt to excuse his behavior. The bottom line is that MOST people don't have BILLIONS of dollars invested DIRECTLY into corporations with unethical behavior.
Does Gates foundation fund charities? Well, maybe they do. The questions I have for everyone who thinks that Mr. Gates is doing good is this: Are there any restrictions on the donations,i.e., does the charity have to use ONLY Microsoft products? If the answer is yes, they do have to use ONLY Microsoft products, then do you still believe that is he's doing good charity or good marketing? They are not the same, and they are exclusive.
If you get the point of Kerchoff's principle, you understand why *if* all things are equal *then* open source code is inherently better than closed source code because public disclosure finds the flaws in the source code faster so they can be fixed faster.
If you want to force a *proprietary* vendor to *immediately* fix a vulnerability, you have to disclose it to the public first, as the vendor will have to scramble to fix the vulnerability or risk losing angry customers.
Talking to the vendor first results at best in delay and/or inaction by the vendor, and at worst threats of lawsuits and criminal prosecution by the vendor should you disclose the vulnerability to the public.
In the case of an open source vendor, the code is open to anyone to inspect, and hence is easier to fix. This is why for example Mozilla and Google offers bounties to anyone for finding bugs. They are *actively* encouraging people to find flaws so they can be patched. This is why open source code is better.
h4rm0ny,
You're not the first post I've seen like this, where the posters says something like "I'm a Linux user, I use it at work, I use it at home. I have #N number of Linux boxes, I've used #M linux distros, but I really recommend to people who have never used a computer to use Microsoft (tm) products."
I don't get it. Is it like cognitive dissonance? How can someone say "I'm an expert in technology A *which* I really like and I'm good at, but I advise friends and family to use technology B, which I'm not an expert on *and* I believe is an *inferior* technology?"
I mean you voluntary use Linux and you *sound* like you really like it, so why would advise them to use *any* Microsoft product. If I was paranoid I might say you're a shill, but I'm willing to believe that I'm missing something here and I would like someone to help me out. Why would someone new to the wonderful world of computers be better of using a proprietary product with onerous EULAS, viruses, trojans, malware, etc. rathen than a Freedom platform with none of that nonsense? Is it a matter of distros? Why not tell then to run Ubuntu, or openSuSe, Fedora, etc.? What am I missing?
The reason why most Linux distros have some kind of package management is because there's so much software with inter-related dependencies that it's a pain in the buttox to try to manage all those dependencies by hand.
One key point about the Linux package managers is that they are needed to manage *all* that open source software. Why open source software? Because no (or rather very few) proprietary companies provide proprietary software for Linux. So if you want some kind of functionality under Linux your best option is to write an open source version because there is very little proprietary software for Linux.
Why then is package management bad for Windows, if it's so useful for Linux? Well, because package management is effective if you have can pull source code, compile, and determine dependencies. That means an open source license for the source code. That means that Microsoft is telling it's huge "ecosphere" of proprietary software vendors to "Piss off you sod!", because *their* software doesn't fit the package management model. That leaves 2 possibilities in the Microsoft world:
The package manager is successful and really takes off. Which means most software is open sourced and provided packaged by Microsoft and the proprietary
vendors are so screwed out of existence, as they are no longer needed if you can just do an "apt-get install" on Windows without the vendors.
The independent vendors realize the implication of this package manager and what it means to their bottom lines and either threaten to leave the Microsoft world for Apple OS X or Microsoft drops the package manager idea.
Is your argument supposed to mean that *we* should trust is the pin-striped suit wearing Dr. Fred MBogo with the 100 million dollar home, because he makes a lot of money?
Because in my interpretation of your metaphor the only thing that I can think that corresponds to Microsoft's track record would be Dr. Fred MBogo.
I think a more accurate metaphor would be that Open Source corresponds to the FDA where all tests, procedures, and results are publicly reviewable, and that proprietary software like Microsoft's corresponds to superb marketers advertising the latest cancer curing snake oil that must be good because it costs so much and since the manufacturers live in dream mansions they must be legitimate.
Or to put it simply: open source chemistry, proprietary software alchemy. Here's my evidence: from wikipedia, some portions of the definition of the scientific method:
Scientific method refers to a body of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry must be based on gathering observable, empirical and measurable evidence subject to specific principles of reasoning. A scientific method consists of the collection of data through observation and experimentation, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses. ....
Another basic expectation is to document, archive and share all data and methodology so they are available for careful scrutiny by other scientists, thereby allowing other researchers the opportunity to verify results by attempting to reproduce them. This practice, called full disclosure, also allows statistical measures of the reliability of these data to be established.
I've never had a problem with python's whitespace parsing, but I read somewhere that python is so superior it has support for all the other schemes to denote blocks. For example, you can use 'begin' and 'end' keywords, you can also use braces {,} as well. Here's an example demonstrating python's superior syntax:
if foo == 3:
#begin ....block of code here....
#end
else:
#{ ....another block of code here....
#}
You say you don't like 'len' as a name for a length function, that you would prefer using the name 'length'. Well, python is so superior, that you can fix that problem really fast in your code:
length = len
From your posting, you've got lots of experience number crunching. Have you taken a look at numpy and scipy? There optimized modules to give python the speed of fortran for doing linear algebra, statistics, etc. Want to do an svd,linear regression, sampling, etc. in python fast and easy? numpy is your best friend.
The one big showstopper I have with F# (which might (maybe) actually be an awesome language) is of course that it comes from Microsoft, who has a better proven history of screwing people and locking them into Windows than some Oil companies have of finding oil. On what platforms can I use this F# language? Please, no equivocating. I just want to be able to do: "sudo apt-get install F-sharp".
Why should I wrote code in a language that's bound to a platform/OS that's inferior to the one I use on a daily basis from a company who's trying to lock me into their products, when I have free easy access to code from people who don't have as an agenda screwing me over with their licenses, restrictions, treating me like a suspected criminal? If I want a functional programming language, I can run lisp, ocaml, haskell, ML, erlang, none of which restrict me as to which platform or OS I use.
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the conditions that surround him... The unreasonable man adapts surrounding conditions to himself... All progress depends on the unreasonable man."
So you're asking the Free Software People to give up their principles in favor of expediency and thus promote no progress. I think not. I prefer to live in a world of Freedom than one ruled by expediency. Expediency might win a battle but in the end principles win the war. Considering the progress of GPL software for the past 26 years I would say they are doing a damn fine job of promoting positive progress. Better for the reasonable man to use free and open standards codecs than the Free Software People piss away their principles.
Mozilla doesn't have to implement anything, just make the video plugin architecture extensible.
They can't do that as they explain in the blog entry a) that most windows users don't have an H264 codec and b) It's pissing on their principles (my words, not theirs). And I see their point. The Mozilla people want to be able to browse the internet with a completely free stack. That is their point: a completely free stack.
What your suggestion is offering is a technical solution to the problem which unfortunately conflicts with their principle and thus they can't go down the road. I see Mozilla people's point and I agree with them. It's reasonable, logical and consistent. But I also understand there are a lot of people who read slashdot who just don't seem to understand what the point of freedom is.
So, I'm going to propose the following thought experiment for people who just don't get why it's important not to throw away your principles for a quick and easy solution that violates your principles. So suppose you're in the following scenario: you get to recieve a pile of money in exchange for a corporation to cut off your right leg (why? Who knows what their motivation is.)
Do you reject the proposal out of hand without even determining how much money is involved?
Do you bargain for how much money you'll take for the loss of your right leg?
What if it was only a few toes say of one of your siblings, or a living parent, or one of your children if you have any? Would you be willing to bargain away someone else's toes?
Now, some of you might be willing to bargain but rationalize to yourself "Hey, I didn't sell out cheap, I got $XYZ dollars for my right leg! Or. hey my brother didn't need his little toe to live, I'll cut him in for 30% of the money". I'm sorry to say that if you're someone who would do a thing like that, I don't understand you and I doubt that I ever will. From my perspective, you have no principles except possibly the pursuit of money which as a goal I just don't see much point. Pursuit of money as a goal is not a socially constructive purpose. If this is you then it's obvious why you don't grok Stallman and the Free Software Foundation. If you happen to be an American, you probably also don't grok the value of the Bill of Rights either right up until a cop splits your head open for resisting arrest while doing nothing. Then all of a sudden you might appreciate your freedoms with a little more enthusiasm.
As the blg points out that yes, H264 patents will run out on 2017, but that is not the end of patented video codecs, there will be an H265 that follows it and so on. If you value freedom then you can't piss away your freedom or others' freedom by compromising on freedom in the name of expediency.
This is what I was thinking. The biggest threat to OSS is not forms of less open and more closed software, the two can coexist
Jeremy Allison mentioned it briefly, but I don't think they really can. Let me specific, I think that you're right that in an ideal world both forms of software licensing "could" exist. But I've also learned from experience that in this world they can't. Why not? Because Microsoft doesn't want to exist in a world of Open Software. I think their record of business dealings demonstrates this behavior, everything from the Halloween Documents, to "Linux is a cancer", "Linux is violating 200+ of Microsoft's patents" (but they never mention which ones), to funding SCO's lawsuit, The whole turning ISO's integrity into shit with their antics on pushing their OOXML format, the Tom Tom lawsuit, etc.
I know based on what I have seen of Stallman and the Free Software Foundation, that they are perfectly willing to let Microsoft live, not that they would encourage the use of closed software, but they wouldn't use dirty handed tricks like Microsoft. I can't say the same about Microsoft.
I hear what you're saying, and an argument like this was made some years ago on osnews.com (a woman named Eugenia comes to mind.) But the thing is, these coder folks aren't coding a high school homework assignment, they're writing some seriously serious code. They don't need negative criticism --- they get a lot of that from shills, astroturfers, and trolls. And even constructive criticism like for example comments about "improving" the UI to gimp, while it might be genuine, and honest goodwill, and it might even be correct just isn't as valuable as the most important commidity of all to hackers: code. There is no substitute to good code.
Yes, you can throw money at people to write F/OSS code and that's appreciated because it gives coders a chance to do something they love to do, but other than financial support for coders to write the code, the code itself is the most precious commodity. If there's a F/OSS application that you think stinks and could use some improvement as a service to yourself and to the F/OSS community take the time to study the code, and throw a patch at the developers. It doesn't have to be War-and-Peace sized, just a proof-of-concept patch would be heartily welcome. Really, you will get a chance to flex your coding muscles, you'll get a chance to feel good about performing a constructive act for the community *and* the F/OSS community will benefit from your generosity.
Isn't that the method every one uses when they don't know the answer to a question? Just google it and you'll find out what other people have to say. Or, if you like, just go to stackoverflow.com and ask your question there. It's not like someone's holding a gun to your head forbidding you from just asking?
An ISO MPEG-4 audio video player is already built into EVERYTHING, there is no opportunity to change it now
So? I don't see any reason why you can't just upgrade to a video player that can play Ogg Theora.
Ogg is a hobbyist format
I could be wrong but console game makers use Ogg Vorbis for their audio files. Maybe not all of them, but I was pretty sure Lego Star Wars does.
there is the whole professional toolchain of cameras, recorders, editing suites, encoders, servers.
I and anybody else who uses Linux have a toolchain as well. It's called Linux. I mean what's so hard about taking funky video made by Joe User and then hitting it with ffmpeg2theora? So what if their toolchain isn't Linux? It's not as if it can't be transcoded to Ogg Theora.
The idea that the W3C is going to tell Pixar and Dolby and such how to make audio video is insane.
W3C concerns itself with web standards. It's up to Pixar and Dolby to decide if they want to comply with the web standards published by W3C. This doesn't have anything to do with why Ogg Theora can't be used by Google which is neither Pixar nor Dolby for that matter.
You use various codecs on a workstation to get your editing done, you don't demand that the consumer have a dozen codecs in their video player, it's not practical.
Sure I can. Step 1: Install Debian. Step 2: apt-get install "world". Done. Or, to make it more simply, if people don't want to use Linux, how about just downloading mplayer or vlc? They run just fine on Windows and Apple as well. I mean it's not as if Adobe doesn't require people to *download* a plugin so that you can watch flash videos? Why is it reasonable for Adobe to be able to "force" people to download a flash plugin, but it's not reasonable to expect people to download mplayer or vlc to watch all sorts of video codecs?
That is why an iPod can play more hours of MPEG-4 H.264 than many laptops
I could be confused but I thought you could make ipods play Ogg Theora when running Linux on them. And it's not as if Apple, Inc. couldn't make a firmware update to the ipod OS so it can Ogg Theora.
This whole debate happened 10 years ago already.
No it didn't. Ogg theora wasn't around 10 years ago.
You're way too late to change the consumer audio video standard to something other than MPEG-4 H.264/AAC. And you certainly can't change it to something that isn't at least technically superior.
If I remember correctly mp3 is a standard that;s been around for 25 years? That was pushed by consumers, not manufacturers, especially not the likes of RIAA. Manufacturers had to scramble to provide support for a format that enough care wanted. I don't see how your argument changes that fact: if enough consumers demand it, then manufacturers who want to make a profit will provide a way. As to whether or not it's superior, I don't think flash was superior when youtube.com started using, and even if you don't agree, consider betamax vs. the VHS format. The inferior format won. So it's not a given to assume technically superior formats must win everytime, not saying that Ogg Theora is a superior or inferior format.
it requires too much bandwidth,
You keep going on about bandwidth. Do you think that Ogg Theora has worse compression than the flash that's being used now? Why then do you keep going on about it? Ogg Theora doesn't have to the best compression of all the video codecs. It just has to be good enough. And I haven't seen a convincing argument yet that it doesn't.
I'm sorry to hear of your bad experience with the Intel G45 drivers. My wife recently purchased a Toshiba laptop with the Intel M4500(?) integrated chipset precisely so we wouldn't have to deal with proprietary crap drivers (my experience with NVidia drivers was that the proprietary driver with its binary blob was great right up until it crashed my kernel and/or the X session. What added insult to injury was that the hardware became "legacy hardware" and I had to use the "legacy" driver. I also don't care much for binary drivers that are tied down to a specific Linux kernel version. Yes, I could download the source for the "legacy" driver and compile my own binary version, but that was a pain in the ass.)
To wrap it up: I took the laptop for a spin with Ubuntu 9.10 and I got the 3d effects working hunky dory, no fuss, no muss, no downloading special drivers etc. So yeah, I do prefer my drivers with a Free(dom) license. I've had better experiences with Free(dom) software than not.
BTW, I think calling those of us who agree with RMS stance on software as "Maoists" is kind of perverse. I think a good argument could be made that GNU is compatible with democracy (FREEDOM) whereas proprietary is compatible with Communism (Do as we say or get shot.)
This demonstrates exactly why the phone network provider has to be decoupled from the cell phone vendor. What is the subtext of this? That the consumers are nothing more than serfs for the phone network providers to buy and sell as they please. That's the point. You have NO choice with Verizon. It's not YOUR phone it's THEIR phone.
Microsoft couldn't pay enough people to use exclusively bing *and* keep their word, so why bother with the common citizen and instead go directly to the phone network? After all, the phone network is the only the thing that matters. Who gives a F*** about you and me and what *we* want? Certainly not verizon with this maneuver. The worst part? I don't think it has even occurred to the management at verizon how deeply offensive this maneuver is. To FORCIBLY lock people into 1 choice of search engine?!?! WTF? What are they smoking?!?!
I think it's time that Congress and the President (who's a blackberry customer) is informed of what exactly verizon thinks of their freedom of choice. Talk about Dumb Ass Maneuver!
You do realize that to be a member of the Free Software Movement, you have to, I don't know, *agree* with its founding principles? So, discussions about promoting proprietary software in a Free Software community would be, I don't know, INAPPROPRIATE? If you want to discuss promoting proprietary software, why not do so in a forum which encourages the use of proprietary software like say maybe Microsoft's community website (they do have one, don't they? I mean a *community* web site?) While you're there, as a useful exercise, you might want to try to see what kind of reception you get when you try to promote Free Software alternatives over the proprietary software by bringing up the issue of promoting Linux use, or ditching Visual Studio in favor of the GNU build toolchain. You may be surprised by the reception you receive.
>I think that's a preposterous rule! You mean to tell me that folks who work on open source software, but happen to also work on non-OSS for their employers (Microsoft, VMware, etc) aren't allowed to talk about the work that actually helps them put food on the table and may even HELP make open-source software better?
Maybe a different perspective would help illuminate the issue:
Do you believe that it would be unfair of Microsoft to have a rule discouraging any Microsoft employee to actively promote Apple products while being identified as a *Microsoft* employee?
Do you believe that the Coca Cola corporation tolerates employees drinking Pepsi Cola drinks on their premises?
Do you believe that Steve Jobs would tolerate even for a minute any Apple employee who took money from Microsoft in order to appear as an Apple employee in a Microsoft sponsored ad claiming the Microsoft Zune was light years better than the ipod? What if the Apple employee's family was STARVING and this was the only way for the Apple employee to feed his POOR LITTLE BABIES? Do you think Steve Jobs would make an exception? Do you think Ballmer or Gates would be different? Do you know their history in management?
If you think it's reasonable for a corporation to have rules discouraging members from promoting competitor's products on the corporation's grounds (and yes, that includes their web sites), why then are you giving Stallman crap for having the same policy?
And that putting "food on their tables" argument is weak. Does anyone get paid for posting on Planet Gnome? No? Then how does posting anything on Planet Gnome "put food on their tables?" Maybe you mean it gives the developers exposure, so folks know who they are? What does that have to do with proprietary software? Exposure is exposure. You don't need proprietary software for that. Certainly not on a GNU web site.
I'm also having trouble accepting the argument that working on proprietary software will somehow make Free Software better. Stallman's experience back in 1984 with Xerox's proprietary laser printer driver demonstrated perfectly why developing proprietary software will not make Free Software better. Proprietary always wants to remain proprietary. That's kind of what proprietary means -- not sharing with others. So how does "not sharing" as a policy lead to a policy of "sharing"????
Since you've mentioned that you don't have much experience with the open source movement (which is NOT the same as the Free Software movement) I would urge you to learn more about Stallman and the Free Software Foundation by starting with wikipedia. I think you'll be surprised to discover that Stallman is a) consistent b) usually right. Here are some urls to start you out:
And my favorite example of what happens when you choose to use proprietary software over Free Software. Torvalds moved the Linux Kernel project to using the proprietary version control software, bitkeeper (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bitkeeper), even though Stallman warned him that sooner or later he would get burned on using it due to the proprietary restrictions.
Stallman, it turned out, was correct. Although you might have trouble getting Torvalds to admit it. The gist of it is that Torvalds was forced to create his own version control system, git (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Git_(software) ), as a result of having the bitkeeper license revoked for the Linux developers.
Slashdot Mirror
The correlation is simple: BPA correlates to cans of soda consumed which correlates to high fructose corn syrup ingested which correlates to obesity. It's not that BPA causes obesity, it's that it's in the same delivery system as the cause of obesity: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM
The first 2 statements are true statements about the human condition. The third is a fallacious deduction made by incorrect application of logic. The most you could say logically without additional data is that "if someone dies it may have been from pancreatic cancer."
Another way that thinking can become defective is situations involving the reality of the universe in which an individual rejects valid observational data that contradicts their assumptions about the universe. To give you an example of defective thinking consider individuals whose religious beliefs require them to believe that the universe is no older than a few thousand years old, that the world was created in 7 days, that every word in the bible is both divinely inspired, literal, and infallible. When such individuals are presented with fossils of species that no longer exist, that can be dated by various techniques involving radioactive decay rates to be thousands, or even millions older than the supposed creation of the earth, or when the individuals are presented with an explanation of the General theory of relativity, the gravitational red shift and its implications for how far away some objects truly are in both time and space such as billions of years light years away and billions of years ago, such individuals reject the observational data as obviously incorrect or misunderstood, because the data contradicts their religious beliefs. That ability to hold onto assumptions about the universe in spite of the fact that valid data that contradicts those assumption is what constitutes defective thinking.
I respectfully disagree that Windows is the best. It's always been my experience that Windows is nothing more than a trap to lock people into Microsoft products, products designed as much as possible to not be compatible with open standards. I don't know what your experience with Linux has been, but my experience has been that configuring and installing "Office" products is trivially easy with any Debian based distro, or even RedHat. If you've seen people attempting to replicate Microsoft products using "home brew 'free' solutions that are undocumented, unreliable and impossible for another employee to figure out what is going on" then I would have to guess those people are new to linux and don't realize that almost every Linux distro comes with a package manager, a package manager that can install free and open standard office automation software that's been available for years. I would encourage you to tell your friends to read up on Ubuntu or Linux Mint and give either either one a shot and especially practice using their package managers to see how easy it is to install software. It's really amazing how much software comes prepackaged in Debian based Linux distros.
You mean like CP/M? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CP/M
> He gave us Windows
He didn't give us Windows, he forced windows on us by having an exclusive contract with the PC vendors.
You know who Billy is really more like? He's like the rich guy in that Jodie Foster movie, "Contact" who fesses up before he dies that he didn't receive so generously from people, but instead took so generously from the people. Except, in the movie the bastard admits it. In real life BillyG hasn't. I suspect that if he's going to admit it (which no one should hold their breath waiting) he'll do it on his death bed so he can't be chewed out for the damage he's wreaked on the computing sector.
Can we please stop the shilling for BillyG now?
There's a reason as stated in Lustig's presentation about why eating fruits as a source of sugar is NOT bad -- it's because the fruits don't just contain fructose, they also contain fiber, a substance which among other things inhibits the absorption of fructose through the intestines, unlike the sugar/fructose that's put into candy, salad dressings, junk food in general and soda which have NO FIBER. That's something you would have picked up *HAD YOU WATCHED EITHER VIDEO*. If it makes you feel any better, *I* appreciate you letting me know what kind of diet you are eating and the results you're getting. Based on Lustig's presentation and the South Beach diet I've managed to lose 50lbs. since September 1st just by ditching the junk food + sodas + any foods high in sugars (but with no fiber) or carbs such as potatos (which if you're not familiar are processed into sugars by the human body). I'm going to try switching to a higher fruit diet to see if I can get results similar to yours.
It's not meant to be a point of criticism, but it's not meat that's making so many American's fat -- it's fructose in the diet from table sugar and just as bad high corn fructose syrup. Here's a link to a fascinating video by Dr. Robert Lustig, an endocrinologist specializing in childhood obesity, entitled "The Bitter Truth About Sugar" that covers among other topics the biochemical process that connects fructose to creation of fat cells: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBnniua6-oM. Checkout the history between the size of soda cans/bottles and the correlation to obesity rates in America. If you just want the highlights from the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdMjKEncojQ In my own personal research it's mind blowing the amount of fructose in soda vs. other food products. The amount of sugar in a low sugar whole wheat slice of bread: 1g. The amount of sugar in a 24 oz. Dr. Pepper bottle: 80g! Unholy bat guano! It's a miracle that people's pancreas don't explode from the amount of sugar consumed on a daily basis.
This difference is caused by the fact that hackers and malware programmers generally love GNU/Linux. Therefor they report the bug first, then disclose it to the public and never exploit it. For Windows bugs they do it exactly the other way around.
This is not the first time I've heard something like it, and I still don't understand it. How can all hackers and malware programmers "generally love" Linux so much that they don't attack Linux sites? Can this really be true? I don't see how, but for the sake of argument, assuming that statement is true, WHY would hackers and malware programmer loooovvvvvvvee Linux so much and not Microsoft that they protect Linux and attack Microsoft? Why?
To put it even more bluntly: "commodity" services and protocols are good things for customers; they promote competition and choice. Therefore, for Microsoft to win, the customer must lose.
Microsoft truly behaves as though it corporately believes that there's only a fixed pool of key ideas, most already discovered, which software designers must squabble over in zero-sum competition until the end of time. In that game, the only definition of `winning' is cornering enough goodies to guarantee you a monopoly lock.
assert one's viewpoint at the potential expense of another. It can be useful when achieving one's objectives outweighs one's concern for the relationship.
Here's the definition of accommodation:
surrender one's own needs and wishes to accommodate the other party.
Let's analyze the Nokia-Microsoft "deal". What has Microsoft gained?
Why do people allow chairmen to make ignorant remarks like that? Friends don't let friends make asinine remarks about security without at least understanding the issues: Kerckhoff's Principle.
It was a well written, respectful, explanation excusing Mr. Gates' behavior by rationalizing that everybody's money in some way or another funds "bad" things in life. I, however, don't agree nor do I accept any attempt to excuse his behavior. The bottom line is that MOST people don't have BILLIONS of dollars invested DIRECTLY into corporations with unethical behavior. Does Gates foundation fund charities? Well, maybe they do. The questions I have for everyone who thinks that Mr. Gates is doing good is this: Are there any restrictions on the donations,i.e., does the charity have to use ONLY Microsoft products? If the answer is yes, they do have to use ONLY Microsoft products, then do you still believe that is he's doing good charity or good marketing? They are not the same, and they are exclusive.
Let me just start with a wikipedia entry, on Kerchoff's principle: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerckhoffs'_principle
If you get the point of Kerchoff's principle, you understand why *if* all things are equal *then* open source code is inherently better than closed source code because public disclosure finds the flaws in the source code faster so they can be fixed faster.
If you want to force a *proprietary* vendor to *immediately* fix a vulnerability, you have to disclose it to the public first, as the vendor will have to scramble to fix the vulnerability or risk losing angry customers.
Talking to the vendor first results at best in delay and/or inaction by the vendor, and at worst threats of lawsuits and criminal prosecution by the vendor should you disclose the vulnerability to the public.
It's like that video by that law professor, the one that advises you not to talk to police. Here's the url: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4097602514885833865#
In the case of an open source vendor, the code is open to anyone to inspect, and hence is easier to fix. This is why for example Mozilla and Google offers bounties to anyone for finding bugs. They are *actively* encouraging people to find flaws so they can be patched. This is why open source code is better.
h4rm0ny, You're not the first post I've seen like this, where the posters says something like "I'm a Linux user, I use it at work, I use it at home. I have #N number of Linux boxes, I've used #M linux distros, but I really recommend to people who have never used a computer to use Microsoft (tm) products." I don't get it. Is it like cognitive dissonance? How can someone say "I'm an expert in technology A *which* I really like and I'm good at, but I advise friends and family to use technology B, which I'm not an expert on *and* I believe is an *inferior* technology?" I mean you voluntary use Linux and you *sound* like you really like it, so why would advise them to use *any* Microsoft product. If I was paranoid I might say you're a shill, but I'm willing to believe that I'm missing something here and I would like someone to help me out. Why would someone new to the wonderful world of computers be better of using a proprietary product with onerous EULAS, viruses, trojans, malware, etc. rathen than a Freedom platform with none of that nonsense? Is it a matter of distros? Why not tell then to run Ubuntu, or openSuSe, Fedora, etc.? What am I missing?
One key point about the Linux package managers is that they are needed to manage *all* that open source software. Why open source software? Because no (or rather very few) proprietary companies provide proprietary software for Linux. So if you want some kind of functionality under Linux your best option is to write an open source version because there is very little proprietary software for Linux.
Why then is package management bad for Windows, if it's so useful for Linux? Well, because package management is effective if you have can pull source code, compile, and determine dependencies. That means an open source license for the source code. That means that Microsoft is telling it's huge "ecosphere" of proprietary software vendors to "Piss off you sod!", because *their* software doesn't fit the package management model. That leaves 2 possibilities in the Microsoft world:
Is your argument supposed to mean that *we* should trust is the pin-striped suit wearing Dr. Fred MBogo with the 100 million dollar home, because he makes a lot of money?
Because in my interpretation of your metaphor the only thing that I can think that corresponds to Microsoft's track record would be Dr. Fred MBogo.
I think a more accurate metaphor would be that Open Source corresponds to the FDA where all tests, procedures, and results are publicly reviewable, and that proprietary software like Microsoft's corresponds to superb marketers advertising the latest cancer curing snake oil that must be good because it costs so much and since the manufacturers live in dream mansions they must be legitimate.
Or to put it simply: open source chemistry, proprietary software alchemy. Here's my evidence: from wikipedia, some portions of the definition of the scientific method:
Scientific method refers to a body of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry must be based on gathering observable, empirical and measurable evidence subject to specific principles of reasoning. A scientific method consists of the collection of data through observation and experimentation, and the formulation and testing of hypotheses.
....
Another basic expectation is to document, archive and share all data and methodology so they are available for careful scrutiny by other scientists, thereby allowing other researchers the opportunity to verify results by attempting to reproduce them. This practice, called full disclosure, also allows statistical measures of the reliability of these data to be established.
I've never had a problem with python's whitespace parsing, but I read somewhere that python is so superior it has support for all the other schemes to denote blocks. For example, you can use 'begin' and 'end' keywords, you can also use braces {,} as well. Here's an example demonstrating python's superior syntax:
if foo == 3:
....block of code here....
....another block of code here....
#begin
#end
else:
#{
#}
You say you don't like 'len' as a name for a length function, that you would prefer using the name 'length'. Well, python is so superior, that you can fix that problem really fast in your code:
length = len
From your posting, you've got lots of experience number crunching. Have you taken a look at numpy and scipy? There optimized modules to give python the speed of fortran for doing linear algebra, statistics, etc. Want to do an svd,linear regression, sampling, etc. in python fast and easy? numpy is your best friend.
The one big showstopper I have with F# (which might (maybe) actually be an awesome language) is of course that it comes from Microsoft, who has a better proven history of screwing people and locking them into Windows than some Oil companies have of finding oil. On what platforms can I use this F# language? Please, no equivocating. I just want to be able to do: "sudo apt-get install F-sharp".
Why should I wrote code in a language that's bound to a platform/OS that's inferior to the one I use on a daily basis from a company who's trying to lock me into their products, when I have free easy access to code from people who don't have as an agenda screwing me over with their licenses, restrictions, treating me like a suspected criminal? If I want a functional programming language, I can run lisp, ocaml, haskell, ML, erlang, none of which restrict me as to which platform or OS I use.
Here's a relevant quote from Geore Bernard Shaw. Quote:
"The reasonable man adapts himself to the conditions that surround him... The unreasonable man adapts surrounding conditions to himself... All progress depends on the unreasonable man."
So you're asking the Free Software People to give up their principles in favor of expediency and thus promote no progress. I think not. I prefer to live in a world of Freedom than one ruled by expediency. Expediency might win a battle but in the end principles win the war. Considering the progress of GPL software for the past 26 years I would say they are doing a damn fine job of promoting positive progress. Better for the reasonable man to use free and open standards codecs than the Free Software People piss away their principles.
Mozilla doesn't have to implement anything, just make the video plugin architecture extensible.
They can't do that as they explain in the blog entry a) that most windows users don't have an H264 codec and b) It's pissing on their principles (my words, not theirs). And I see their point. The Mozilla people want to be able to browse the internet with a completely free stack. That is their point: a completely free stack.
What your suggestion is offering is a technical solution to the problem which unfortunately conflicts with their principle and thus they can't go down the road. I see Mozilla people's point and I agree with them. It's reasonable, logical and consistent. But I also understand there are a lot of people who read slashdot who just don't seem to understand what the point of freedom is.
So, I'm going to propose the following thought experiment for people who just don't get why it's important not to throw away your principles for a quick and easy solution that violates your principles. So suppose you're in the following scenario: you get to recieve a pile of money in exchange for a corporation to cut off your right leg (why? Who knows what their motivation is.)
What if it was only a few toes say of one of your siblings, or a living parent, or one of your children if you have any? Would you be willing to bargain away someone else's toes?
Now, some of you might be willing to bargain but rationalize to yourself "Hey, I didn't sell out cheap, I got $XYZ dollars for my right leg! Or. hey my brother didn't need his little toe to live, I'll cut him in for 30% of the money". I'm sorry to say that if you're someone who would do a thing like that, I don't understand you and I doubt that I ever will. From my perspective, you have no principles except possibly the pursuit of money which as a goal I just don't see much point. Pursuit of money as a goal is not a socially constructive purpose. If this is you then it's obvious why you don't grok Stallman and the Free Software Foundation. If you happen to be an American, you probably also don't grok the value of the Bill of Rights either right up until a cop splits your head open for resisting arrest while doing nothing. Then all of a sudden you might appreciate your freedoms with a little more enthusiasm.
As the blg points out that yes, H264 patents will run out on 2017, but that is not the end of patented video codecs, there will be an H265 that follows it and so on. If you value freedom then you can't piss away your freedom or others' freedom by compromising on freedom in the name of expediency.
This is what I was thinking. The biggest threat to OSS is not forms of less open and more closed software, the two can coexist
Jeremy Allison mentioned it briefly, but I don't think they really can. Let me specific, I think that you're right that in an ideal world both forms of software licensing "could" exist. But I've also learned from experience that in this world they can't. Why not? Because Microsoft doesn't want to exist in a world of Open Software. I think their record of business dealings demonstrates this behavior, everything from the Halloween Documents, to "Linux is a cancer", "Linux is violating 200+ of Microsoft's patents" (but they never mention which ones), to funding SCO's lawsuit, The whole turning ISO's integrity into shit with their antics on pushing their OOXML format, the Tom Tom lawsuit, etc.
I know based on what I have seen of Stallman and the Free Software Foundation, that they are perfectly willing to let Microsoft live, not that they would encourage the use of closed software, but they wouldn't use dirty handed tricks like Microsoft. I can't say the same about Microsoft.
I hear what you're saying, and an argument like this was made some years ago on osnews.com (a woman named Eugenia comes to mind.) But the thing is, these coder folks aren't coding a high school homework assignment, they're writing some seriously serious code. They don't need negative criticism --- they get a lot of that from shills, astroturfers, and trolls. And even constructive criticism like for example comments about "improving" the UI to gimp, while it might be genuine, and honest goodwill, and it might even be correct just isn't as valuable as the most important commidity of all to hackers: code. There is no substitute to good code.
Yes, you can throw money at people to write F/OSS code and that's appreciated because it gives coders a chance to do something they love to do, but other than financial support for coders to write the code, the code itself is the most precious commodity. If there's a F/OSS application that you think stinks and could use some improvement as a service to yourself and to the F/OSS community take the time to study the code, and throw a patch at the developers. It doesn't have to be War-and-Peace sized, just a proof-of-concept patch would be heartily welcome. Really, you will get a chance to flex your coding muscles, you'll get a chance to feel good about performing a constructive act for the community *and* the F/OSS community will benefit from your generosity.
Isn't that the method every one uses when they don't know the answer to a question? Just google it and you'll find out what other people have to say. Or, if you like, just go to stackoverflow.com and ask your question there. It's not like someone's holding a gun to your head forbidding you from just asking?
An ISO MPEG-4 audio video player is already built into EVERYTHING, there is no opportunity to change it now
So? I don't see any reason why you can't just upgrade to a video player that can play Ogg Theora.
Ogg is a hobbyist format
I could be wrong but console game makers use Ogg Vorbis for their audio files. Maybe not all of them, but I was pretty sure Lego Star Wars does.
there is the whole professional toolchain of cameras, recorders, editing suites, encoders, servers.
I and anybody else who uses Linux have a toolchain as well. It's called Linux. I mean what's so hard about taking funky video made by Joe User and then hitting it with ffmpeg2theora? So what if their toolchain isn't Linux? It's not as if it can't be transcoded to Ogg Theora.
The idea that the W3C is going to tell Pixar and Dolby and such how to make audio video is insane.
W3C concerns itself with web standards. It's up to Pixar and Dolby to decide if they want to comply with the web standards published by W3C. This doesn't have anything to do with why Ogg Theora can't be used by Google which is neither Pixar nor Dolby for that matter.
You use various codecs on a workstation to get your editing done, you don't demand that the consumer have a dozen codecs in their video player, it's not practical.
Sure I can. Step 1: Install Debian. Step 2: apt-get install "world". Done. Or, to make it more simply, if people don't want to use Linux, how about just downloading mplayer or vlc? They run just fine on Windows and Apple as well. I mean it's not as if Adobe doesn't require people to *download* a plugin so that you can watch flash videos? Why is it reasonable for Adobe to be able to "force" people to download a flash plugin, but it's not reasonable to expect people to download mplayer or vlc to watch all sorts of video codecs?
That is why an iPod can play more hours of MPEG-4 H.264 than many laptops
I could be confused but I thought you could make ipods play Ogg Theora when running Linux on them. And it's not as if Apple, Inc. couldn't make a firmware update to the ipod OS so it can Ogg Theora.
This whole debate happened 10 years ago already.
No it didn't. Ogg theora wasn't around 10 years ago.
You're way too late to change the consumer audio video standard to something other than MPEG-4 H.264/AAC. And you certainly can't change it to something that isn't at least technically superior.
If I remember correctly mp3 is a standard that;s been around for 25 years? That was pushed by consumers, not manufacturers, especially not the likes of RIAA. Manufacturers had to scramble to provide support for a format that enough care wanted. I don't see how your argument changes that fact: if enough consumers demand it, then manufacturers who want to make a profit will provide a way. As to whether or not it's superior, I don't think flash was superior when youtube.com started using, and even if you don't agree, consider betamax vs. the VHS format. The inferior format won. So it's not a given to assume technically superior formats must win everytime, not saying that Ogg Theora is a superior or inferior format.
it requires too much bandwidth,
You keep going on about bandwidth. Do you think that Ogg Theora has worse compression than the flash that's being used now? Why then do you keep going on about it? Ogg Theora doesn't have to the best compression of all the video codecs. It just has to be good enough. And I haven't seen a convincing argument yet that it doesn't.
To wrap it up: I took the laptop for a spin with Ubuntu 9.10 and I got the 3d effects working hunky dory, no fuss, no muss, no downloading special drivers etc. So yeah, I do prefer my drivers with a Free(dom) license. I've had better experiences with Free(dom) software than not.
BTW, I think calling those of us who agree with RMS stance on software as "Maoists" is kind of perverse. I think a good argument could be made that GNU is compatible with democracy (FREEDOM) whereas proprietary is compatible with Communism (Do as we say or get shot.)
This demonstrates exactly why the phone network provider has to be decoupled from the cell phone vendor. What is the subtext of this? That the consumers are nothing more than serfs for the phone network providers to buy and sell as they please. That's the point. You have NO choice with Verizon. It's not YOUR phone it's THEIR phone.
Microsoft couldn't pay enough people to use exclusively bing *and* keep their word, so why bother with the common citizen and instead go directly to the phone network? After all, the phone network is the only the thing that matters. Who gives a F*** about you and me and what *we* want? Certainly not verizon with this maneuver. The worst part? I don't think it has even occurred to the management at verizon how deeply offensive this maneuver is. To FORCIBLY lock people into 1 choice of search engine?!?! WTF? What are they smoking?!?!
I think it's time that Congress and the President (who's a blackberry customer) is informed of what exactly verizon thinks of their freedom of choice. Talk about Dumb Ass Maneuver!
You do realize that to be a member of the Free Software Movement, you have to, I don't know, *agree* with its founding principles? So, discussions about promoting proprietary software in a Free Software community would be, I don't know, INAPPROPRIATE? If you want to discuss promoting proprietary software, why not do so in a forum which encourages the use of proprietary software like say maybe Microsoft's community website (they do have one, don't they? I mean a *community* web site?) While you're there, as a useful exercise, you might want to try to see what kind of reception you get when you try to promote Free Software alternatives over the proprietary software by bringing up the issue of promoting Linux use, or ditching Visual Studio in favor of the GNU build toolchain. You may be surprised by the reception you receive.
Maybe a different perspective would help illuminate the issue:
If you think it's reasonable for a corporation to have rules discouraging members from promoting competitor's products on the corporation's grounds (and yes, that includes their web sites), why then are you giving Stallman crap for having the same policy?
And that putting "food on their tables" argument is weak. Does anyone get paid for posting on Planet Gnome? No? Then how does posting anything on Planet Gnome "put food on their tables?" Maybe you mean it gives the developers exposure, so folks know who they are? What does that have to do with proprietary software? Exposure is exposure. You don't need proprietary software for that. Certainly not on a GNU web site.
I'm also having trouble accepting the argument that working on proprietary software will somehow make Free Software better. Stallman's experience back in 1984 with Xerox's proprietary laser printer driver demonstrated perfectly why developing proprietary software will not make Free Software better. Proprietary always wants to remain proprietary. That's kind of what proprietary means -- not sharing with others. So how does "not sharing" as a policy lead to a policy of "sharing"????
Since you've mentioned that you don't have much experience with the open source movement (which is NOT the same as the Free Software movement) I would urge you to learn more about Stallman and the Free Software Foundation by starting with wikipedia. I think you'll be surprised to discover that Stallman is a) consistent b) usually right. Here are some urls to start you out:
Stallman, it turned out, was correct. Although you might have trouble getting Torvalds to admit it. The gist of it is that Torvalds was forced to create his own version control system, git (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Git_(software) ), as a result of having the bitkeeper license revoked for the Linux developers.