4.1 If our students are to really understand and learn programming and develop software skills, they should learn not only to use computers, but also understand why they function the way they do. This involves learning programing skills. To learn programing, students should have access to source code of the software they use. We trust that you have studied and understood the terms under which the corporation, whose software is currently prescribed for study, licenses its software. It should be emphasised that they do not provide access to source code, which is a a closely guarded secret. By insisting on programs from a particular company, the government is denying our students an opportunity to learn about programs and software development skills. We need not repeat that this policy would not help our community in the long run.
This is exactly why closed source software should banned from educational use. When studying literature you can see how the author strings the words together to create a novel. There is no better way to understand how something works than to examine how the various pieces come together to form the whole.
The fact is, Open Source is not a legal sheild that protects you from the evils of copyright law, in fact, it's a waiving of some of your copyrights you're granted by law in exchange for a promise everybody who modifies your work will waive their copyright too.
Open Source giveths, not takeths away B-)...authors who release code under the GPL does not waive any of their original rights, they just give more rights to the users of their works.
`(2) Notwithstanding the provisions of subsections (a)(2) and (b), a person may develop and employ technological means to circumvent a technological measure, or to circumvent protection afforded by a technological measure, in order to enable the identification and analysis under paragraph (1), or for the purpose of enabling interoperability of an independently created computer program with other programs, if such means are necessary to achieve such interoperability, to the extent that doing so does not constitute infringement under this title.
Further:
`(3) The information acquired through the acts permitted under paragraph (1), and the means permitted under paragraph (2), may be made available to others if the person referred to in paragraph (1) or (2), as the case may be, provides such information or means solely for the purpose of enabling interoperability of an independently created computer program with other programs, and to the extent that doing so does not constitute infringement under this title or violate applicable law other than this section.
Interoperatibity being defined as:
`(4) For purposes of this subsection, the term `interoperability' means the ability of computer programs to exchange information, and of such programs mutually to use the information which has been exchanged.
Being that Linux software players need to exchange the necessary information to decrypt CSS in order to interoperate with Linux drivers before a DVD can be played, why is DeCSS illegal in the first place?
I think the semantics are important. Your wording assumes that Verizon owns the right's to their customers privacy, which the new law clearly and properly states that they do not.
One of the rules states that phone companies may not share call-detail information with other companies without permission.
After all, the data is created by the sequence of numbers a person pushs when making calls just as a book is created by a sequence of keys pressed by the person who is writing the book. You would think this has to fall under the copyright act somewhere, right?
Nah your post is no troll, it is quite thoughtful. But laws protecting privacy and freedom of information actually work quite well together, they just put the power in hands of the person giving up his rights, not the one taking them away.
Maybe a law requiring a company to at least offer an extra cost privacy package would be an option.
No, the customer should be given the option of reducing his bill by giving up his right to privacy, not have to pay more for keeping something he already has.
And yes, now that Debian has begun to move far beyond its "techie-core" roots, there is a large interest in developing newbie-friendly installers and system maintenance utilities. Interested? Get coding! (:
I'm not sure Debian hasn't already moved too far from it's techie roots, and that is why there has been an explosion in source based distros recently. It's okay that stable moves at a snails pace, but unstable doesn't even have software that has become standard on other distributions.
Wow, I was half joking and you seem to be spoiling for a fight, lol.
Linux is what you want it to be...you want a point and click OS with easy installs, no problem use KDE and front end to apt or rpm.
But, since you are an A+ computer student, wouldn't you agree that it is important to understand what is going on underneath that pretty GUI to make all that magic happen?
Let's suppose that you've graduated and have your degree. You land a lucrative job and are happily going about your work until all of sudden one day something goes wrong and your machine won't launch the desktop. What are you going to do?
Now don't you think you'd look pretty silly having all that sheepskin hanging on your wall proclaiming you a computer expert, yet you can't even edit a simple command line script to fix your own computer?
...being as how I only have to pay my credit card but once a month or less I just fire up Konq, click on tools, and change my browser ID to IE 5.5 on Win 98. Takes all of about a minute or so. Every now and then I email the company and tell them how silly it is that they won't take credit for supporting something that they actually do, and then go my merry way with Moz.
Wait a minute here. If you own a book on C programming, and he owns a book on Pascal, you are free to trade your books with each other. It is possible but illegal to scan the book to disk before the trade. Why should music be any different?
If the historical model of the consumer paying for art once and being able to enjoy it for the rest of his life, then it will work. This is the way books, paintings, and music have been sold to consumers for centuries, and in the last few decades movies have joined the list as well.
But if they decide to try to limit the usage term after purchase, which I believe is the real goal of DRM and other copy protection systems, then it will fail because consumers will feel cheated by the industry.
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4.1 If our students are to really understand and learn programming and develop software skills, they should learn not only to use computers, but also understand why they function the way they do. This involves learning programing skills. To learn programing, students should have access to source code of the software they use. We trust that you have studied and understood the terms under which the corporation, whose software is currently prescribed for study, licenses its software. It should be emphasised that they do not provide access to source code, which is a a closely guarded secret. By insisting on programs from a particular company, the government is denying our students an opportunity to learn about programs and software development skills. We need not repeat that this policy would not help our community in the long run.
This is exactly why closed source software should banned from educational use. When studying literature you can see how the author strings the words together to create a novel. There is no better way to understand how something works than to examine how the various pieces come together to form the whole.
Nothing prevents authors from releasing their work under more than one license.
Scanning pages from a book gives me a perfect copy of the book too.
The fact is, Open Source is not a legal sheild that protects you from the evils of copyright law, in fact, it's a waiving of some of your copyrights you're granted by law in exchange for a promise everybody who modifies your work will waive their copyright too.
Open Source giveths, not takeths away B-)...authors who release code under the GPL does not waive any of their original rights, they just give more rights to the users of their works.
Not only that..but further:
`(2) Notwithstanding the provisions of subsections (a)(2) and (b), a person may develop and employ technological means to circumvent a technological measure, or to circumvent protection afforded by a technological measure, in order to enable the identification and analysis under paragraph (1), or for the purpose of enabling interoperability of an independently created computer program with other programs, if such means are necessary to achieve such interoperability, to the extent that doing so does not constitute infringement under this title.
Further:
`(3) The information acquired through the acts permitted under paragraph (1), and the means permitted under paragraph (2), may be made available to others if the person referred to in paragraph (1) or (2), as the case may be, provides such information or means solely for the purpose of enabling interoperability of an independently created computer program with other programs, and to the extent that doing so does not constitute infringement under this title or violate applicable law other than this section.
Interoperatibity being defined as:
`(4) For purposes of this subsection, the term `interoperability' means the ability of computer programs to exchange information, and of such programs mutually to use the information which has been exchanged.
Being that Linux software players need to exchange the necessary information to decrypt CSS in order to interoperate with Linux drivers before a DVD can be played, why is DeCSS illegal in the first place?
There is absolutely no need for you as an end user to ever worry about compiling the kernel. That's what the vendors (e.g. redhat, suse) are for.
Yeah, silly users thinking they should actually compile open source code themselves. What's the world coming to, anyway?
I think the semantics are important. Your wording assumes that Verizon owns the right's to their customers privacy, which the new law clearly and properly states that they do not.
One of the rules states that phone companies may not share call-detail information with other companies without permission.
After all, the data is created by the sequence of numbers a person pushs when making calls just as a book is created by a sequence of keys pressed by the person who is writing the book. You would think this has to fall under the copyright act somewhere, right?
Nah your post is no troll, it is quite thoughtful. But laws protecting privacy and freedom of information actually work quite well together, they just put the power in hands of the person giving up his rights, not the one taking them away.
Maybe a law requiring a company to at least offer an extra cost privacy package would be an option.
No, the customer should be given the option of reducing his bill by giving up his right to privacy, not have to pay more for keeping something he already has.
The founding fathers themselves recognized that those rights were given to us by God.
Thank goodness they also recognized that not everyone believed in the same God and put in the first amendment, eh?
But, anyway, it is ironic to see someone get busted for doing exactly what he was working on to prevent.
I'm looking forward to it then, because I do believe that Debian could be the universal distribution, particularly with the apt-build in the works.
And yes, now that Debian has begun to move far beyond its "techie-core" roots, there is a large interest in developing newbie-friendly installers and system maintenance utilities. Interested? Get coding! (:
I'm not sure Debian hasn't already moved too far from it's techie roots, and that is why there has been an explosion in source based distros recently. It's okay that stable moves at a snails pace, but unstable doesn't even have software that has become standard on other distributions.
You do know the DMCA is a law and not an organisation, do you not?
I'm sure he does, just like everybody else here does. But did you know it is a law that the public does not like?
There's a difference between typing out an entire book and the few seconds/minutes it takes to copy a song/movie.
Why type a book out when you can simply scan it to disk? Copyright laws have worked well for both consumers and publishers for a very long time.
Wow, I was half joking and you seem to be spoiling for a fight, lol.
Linux is what you want it to be...you want a point and click OS with easy installs, no problem use KDE and front end to apt or rpm.
But, since you are an A+ computer student, wouldn't you agree that it is important to understand what is going on underneath that pretty GUI to make all that magic happen?
Let's suppose that you've graduated and have your degree. You land a lucrative job and are happily going about your work until all of sudden one day something goes wrong and your machine won't launch the desktop. What are you going to do?
Now don't you think you'd look pretty silly having all that sheepskin hanging on your wall proclaiming you a computer expert, yet you can't even edit a simple command line script to fix your own computer?
...being as how I only have to pay my credit card but once a month or less I just fire up Konq, click on tools, and change my browser ID to IE 5.5 on Win 98. Takes all of about a minute or so. Every now and then I email the company and tell them how silly it is that they won't take credit for supporting something that they actually do, and then go my merry way with Moz.
I do admire you taking a stand though B-)
...maybe next we'll get a standardized installation system...
./configure --options ...worked on just about every system.
Gee, I thought...
make
make install
The patent office? After all they have information online that anyone can use to violate somebody's elses patent.
Libraries? Those books can be scanned you know, so their very existence threatens somebody elses copyright and compete with commercial bookstores!
What about public television? Why every person who watches C-Span is taking food right out of those other cable network's shareholders mouths!
...because the above poster has been pirating Village People music all these years. Next month he can down load "YMCA" legally!
A license to play it on my stereo? Another to play it on my computer? Yet another play it in my car? Oh, and let's not forget the walkman.
Yeah, that'd stop piracy alright...sheesh!
Wait a minute here. If you own a book on C programming, and he owns a book on Pascal, you are free to trade your books with each other. It is possible but illegal to scan the book to disk before the trade. Why should music be any different?
If the historical model of the consumer paying for art once and being able to enjoy it for the rest of his life, then it will work. This is the way books, paintings, and music have been sold to consumers for centuries, and in the last few decades movies have joined the list as well.
But if they decide to try to limit the usage term after purchase, which I believe is the real goal of DRM and other copy protection systems, then it will fail because consumers will feel cheated by the industry.
this site's spam proofreading policy.
...they seem to be busting them for fraud via spam rather than just the fact that they spam...
They are busting them with old rules, not new ones.