Only an idiot buys "blue sky". Something they can't see, feel or touch; is intangible, and very likely does not even exist, or at least has not been prooven to exist.
IBM carefully selected four patents. In their complaint, on each patent count, they list which SCO products infringe each of IBM's patents.
I admit ignorance of SCO's complete product line. But it seemed to me that thse four pagents are carefully chosen such that all of SCO's current or likely products will infringe at least one of the patents.
If IBM gets a preliminary injunction, then this will cut off all revenue to SCO!. Of course, there is something else that I would like to cut off of each of the executives, but I would settle for them each getting a comfortable jail cell with Buba.
Why only four patents? So that IBM doesn't come off in front of the judge as trying to abuse the legal system. If IBM countered with 2000 patents, it would seem very clear that IBM is just gaming the system.
IBM also, just like Red Hat, asks for SCO to be made to stop their license extortion. With this in place, then SCO will have no money comming in.
Patent lawsuits are expensive to defend. If I understand correctly, you must either (1) proove that you don't infringe, or (2) proove the patent is invalid. Either one takes lots of expensive patent research, sometimes on very old patents.
So we come back to the question: Will SCO last long enough?
What I don't understand is why SCO is so unwilling to show the code this is all about. If it's in the kernel everyone can already see it so why the secrecy and complicated NDA stuff?
Because SCO wants the infringement to continue. (Assuming that they actually is any infringement.)
If SCO shows the source, it will get fixed very quickly. The infringement will stop. And then SCO can't charge each Linux user an introductory price of $666 for a license. (Ooops, got those last two nines the wrong way, I meant $699.)
To extort money from companies and individuals using GNU/Linux. If the code is replaced, they can't ask companies to pay them $699 (or $1399 later) for each license.
In an effort to show that they are not trying to extort money from Linux users, SCO announced that they would lower the introductory price of licenses from $699 to a new lower price of $666.
If the company went into volantary liquidation and there are no outstanding debts then anything left over is split between the shareholders. It depends if the code was actually accounted for as an asset whilst the company was being liquidated. If it was n't and you go on to make money off this code then you could end up being sued.
If the source code was counted as an asset when the company was liquidated, then what you have is a CD that is a copy of source code now owned by whoever bought the code at the liquidation.
the ONLY reason SCO hasn't shone the code as they know that once shown and proven one way or another, the codebase will change to be legally correct and that's not what they want because they doesn't give them a leg to stand on.
In that particular view, they are, in a sense, impeding justice and preventing what they view to be offenders from "fixing their mistakes" as that would pull the soapbox right out from under them.
This very action on SCO's part may be their undoing.
You're damned if you do show the "infringing" code, and you're damned if you don't. But the correct thing to do would be to get the infringement to stop ASAP. Instead SCO is trying to turn Linux into a money machine rather than get the infringement to stop.
If the infringement were to stop, then they couldn't charge $699 licenses. They want the infringement to continue. This very fact will not look good in front of the judge.
Red Hat is going to be broke at the end of this and not make it.
Doesn't RedHat have a business partner with deep pockets? (IBM) Who might be able to help in various ways, such as buying artificially high priced licenses to something that RedHat would make exclusively for IBM?
Similarly with this type of game playing, SCO can sell "special" licenses to Microsoft.
Then the OEM should replace the "Windows Restore" CD with a bootable "Hardware diagnostic" CD. You put in the CD. Reboot. Disk comes up and says everything is okay with the hardware. End of support call.
The way they'll close the loophole is by changing the EULA in Windows.
First, they might make it printable, or include at least part of it on paper for the Judge to see.
Second, they'll make it say that if you don't agree with this EULA, then simply destroy the software on the disk and be done with it.
The whole notion of taking software back for a refund dates from sometime ancient time when corporations had some sense of ethics. Just remove the "take it back" and "refund" clauses. Simply require you to destroy it.
The description of how his translator works is not all that different from the description that the Star Trek The Next Generation Technical Manual gives for the universal translator.
The ST:TNG tech manual says something about having to build up a "translation matrix" between the two languages. The UT is able to build this up by itself based on examples from the two languages. (It's been years since the read the ST:TNG Tech Manual. But this is about how I remember it.)
Yet another example of science fiction predicting technological fact.
While US funds the Total Information Awareness Agency, the German State funds Anonymity is not a crime
That is because we have not had our Police State experience yet. After the Untied Police States of America comes into being, and then eventually is overthrown, we will value things like anonymity. If we never have this experience, then we might instead just continue to have a gradual erosion of many rights. Of course, I suppose that eventually this would have to lead to the Unites Police States. The pendulum will probably have to swing fully one direction and then back.
They'd subpoena your weapon, and it would be up to you to show evidence that you didn't kill the cashier, 'cause they already have evidence that you did.
I agree they would subpoena your weapon.
I agree that they have evidence, but not that YOU did it.
I disagree that you would have to proove that you did not do it. The burden of proof is upon them to proove it. All you have to show is reasonable doubt.
It is speculation. It is directly related to the original story.
If part of a multimedia system could be compromised by the actual media file it plays, then this could be a huge win for the RIAA.
Oh ! I get it ! Its' your average anti-microsoft junkie talk!
I'll admit that the notion that Microsoft might actually do this on purpose is all in fun. I don't seriously believe that they have done this.
But back to my first point, for a moment. Suppose that someone, let's say Microsoft, implemented a system where the media files played could compromise the system? And suppose that implementation were purposeful?
How is this speculation not on topic in this discussion?
Maybe security "flaws" in multimedia software are not a bug. They may be a wonderful Quality Protection feature brought to you by your good friends at Macrovision. Paid for by the RIAA.
Now the RIAA can put poisioned files onto P2P. But instead of just being annoying audio admonishing you not to steal, they can own your computer.
All they need is for it to be legal for them to hack your computer.
IBM has, for a long time, had a crypto coprocessor card.
Is this card subject to the patents?
The card is quite neat actually. I first learned of it on Slashdot.
Basic description...
Thousands of dollars. PCI card. It has a secret key inside. Thus it can sign things. You can communicate securely with it. It can securely generate a new secret key that can be securely transferred to another card elsewhere. (For instance, a master card generates a new key for all of my ATM's. It can encrypt the new key and then export it off the card. Couriers can carry the encrypted key to other cards. Only the processor on the crypto coprocessor in the ATM can actually decrypt the new key and know what the key is. Basically, no human EVER knows what the key is that is used between the ATM's and the master system.) The PCI card is tamperproof. It has a small metal box on it. Inside this box is a "blanket" of fine wire mesh. Batteries on the card power the crypto processor. The card detects tampering attempts and erases all of the secrets on the card. The purpose of the card is that it can know secrets that are truly secret, that is, the secret never exists outside of this card, or maybe only on this card and other similar cards, but never outside of a crypto coprocessor card. The card detects tampering of air pressure, electrical changes, radiation x-rays, etc.
Every time I think about TPM and DRM I think of this IBM card soldered to your motherboard. It has since become clear that TPM is not as tamperproof as this card. It provides high performance crypto functions in hardware, like this card, and has embedded "secrets" like this card, but those secrets could be extracted from the TPM on the motherboard by a dillegent effort.
One more interesting thing about IBM's crypto card. So how can you know that the secret key on the card is not known to IBM? Well IBM describes in a publicly downloadable PDF everything about the card, how it is manufactured, etc. (I read it before when I first learned of this card on slashdot). You buy 10 cards. Take 9 of them apart. See for yourself that the firmware inside the secure processor actually does secretly generate the key during manufacture and that everything works exactly as IBM says it does. Then take the 10th card and assume that it works the same way and that they key within it is truly a secret that is confined within the little metal box.
So is this covered by the patent? Owners of ATM's will not be happy.
Why is it necessary for all of Slashdot to have a single, consistent, die-hard view of things?
Because religious zealotry does not allow for a compromise position. This is especially true if you are still a baby and idealistic. (Early 20's or thereabouts.) Is this not obvious from observations of other religious fanatics?
Back in the day, there were four major applications / protocols in use. These were basic staples that everyone had.
Telnet
E-Mail
FTP
Usenet
Now sometimes, FTP was used to distribute copyright materials.
My point, BitTorrent has legit uses. Just because it isn't being used that way doesn't mean it couldn't be. All it would take would be for someone major to decide that it is a great way to distribute some big project. Say, Red Hat. Say, OpenOffice. Say Mozilla.
Suppose movie trailers were distributed this way.
The percent of use of legit vs. non-legit is a red herring IMHO. Using your logic, the VCR would indeed have been banned, as the MPAA tried to do. Most people used it just to make unauthorized copies of copyright material. Hmmm.
So are we doomed to only have the forms of file distribution that are currently NOT being used for bad purposes? And if any mechanism, say the use of HTTP, becomes widespread as a mechanism to distribute copyright content without permission, should we ban it?
Re:CDBurners not the end for high-capacity Zip dri
on
DVD Burner Round-up
·
· Score: 1
I'm just yanking your chain. Just a couple years ago I was a long, long time Mac user and strong advocate. A few years before that, I was a Mac developer.
But don't you agree that booting should be difficult? You should at least have to configure a complex boot loader that has many little things which can go wrong, making your system unbootable. Heaven forbid that the system can just boot off the right system folder, no matter where it is, and no matter what name it is given. Or that you could rename, and relocate the system folder without ever having to reboot. And on the next reboot, the same system folder will be booted from (even if you have multiple system folders, and some other one is now moved into the old location and given the old name).
Re:CDBurners not the end for high-capacity Zip dri
on
DVD Burner Round-up
·
· Score: 2, Funny
Oh, shut up. Those silly Macs will try to boot off anything that even looks like it might have a filesystem.
Slashdot Mirror
Only an idiot buys "blue sky". Something they can't see, feel or touch; is intangible, and very likely does not even exist, or at least has not been prooven to exist.
How can SCO claim that it did not know what it was distributing? For eight years? They would look pretty stupid in front of the judge.
IBM can of course argue that SCO either knew what they were shipping or should have known.
IBM carefully selected four patents. In their complaint, on each patent count, they list which SCO products infringe each of IBM's patents.
I admit ignorance of SCO's complete product line. But it seemed to me that thse four pagents are carefully chosen such that all of SCO's current or likely products will infringe at least one of the patents.
If IBM gets a preliminary injunction, then this will cut off all revenue to SCO!. Of course, there is something else that I would like to cut off of each of the executives, but I would settle for them each getting a comfortable jail cell with Buba.
Why only four patents? So that IBM doesn't come off in front of the judge as trying to abuse the legal system. If IBM countered with 2000 patents, it would seem very clear that IBM is just gaming the system.
IBM also, just like Red Hat, asks for SCO to be made to stop their license extortion. With this in place, then SCO will have no money comming in.
Patent lawsuits are expensive to defend. If I understand correctly, you must either (1) proove that you don't infringe, or (2) proove the patent is invalid. Either one takes lots of expensive patent research, sometimes on very old patents.
So we come back to the question: Will SCO last long enough?
Of course SCO is going to want $699 added to the price.
Why, because this PDA's Linux kernel has the Enterprise features that SCO owns?
Hey, well, since it's a PDA, SCO will lower their license price to only $666.
What I don't understand is why SCO is so unwilling to show the code this is all about. If it's in the kernel everyone can already see it so why the secrecy and complicated NDA stuff?
Because SCO wants the infringement to continue. (Assuming that they actually is any infringement.)
If SCO shows the source, it will get fixed very quickly. The infringement will stop. And then SCO can't charge each Linux user an introductory price of $666 for a license. (Ooops, got those last two nines the wrong way, I meant $699.)
To extort money from companies and individuals using GNU/Linux. If the code is replaced, they can't ask companies to pay them $699 (or $1399 later) for each license.
In an effort to show that they are not trying to extort money from Linux users, SCO announced that they would lower the introductory price of licenses from $699 to a new lower price of $666.
If the company went into volantary liquidation and there are no outstanding debts then anything left over is split between the shareholders. It depends if the code was actually accounted for as an asset whilst the company was being liquidated. If it was n't and you go on to make money off this code then you could end up being sued.
If the source code was counted as an asset when the company was liquidated, then what you have is a CD that is a copy of source code now owned by whoever bought the code at the liquidation.
Okay, so that is two examples that they are claiming they can show.
the ONLY reason SCO hasn't shone the code as they know that once shown and proven one way or another, the codebase will change to be legally correct and that's not what they want because they doesn't give them a leg to stand on.
In that particular view, they are, in a sense, impeding justice and preventing what they view to be offenders from "fixing their mistakes" as that would pull the soapbox right out from under them.
This very action on SCO's part may be their undoing.
You're damned if you do show the "infringing" code, and you're damned if you don't. But the correct thing to do would be to get the infringement to stop ASAP. Instead SCO is trying to turn Linux into a money machine rather than get the infringement to stop.
If the infringement were to stop, then they couldn't charge $699 licenses. They want the infringement to continue. This very fact will not look good in front of the judge.
Red Hat is going to be broke at the end of this and not make it.
Doesn't RedHat have a business partner with deep pockets? (IBM) Who might be able to help in various ways, such as buying artificially high priced licenses to something that RedHat would make exclusively for IBM?
Similarly with this type of game playing, SCO can sell "special" licenses to Microsoft.
Rewrite suggestion.....
If you do not agree with the terms of this EULA, then you must erase all of the software on the hard drive without using it.
[I Agree] [Erase] ?
There. How's that?
Then the OEM should replace the "Windows Restore" CD with a bootable "Hardware diagnostic" CD. You put in the CD. Reboot. Disk comes up and says everything is okay with the hardware. End of support call.
Incorrect.
The way they'll close the loophole is by changing the EULA in Windows.
First, they might make it printable, or include at least part of it on paper for the Judge to see.
Second, they'll make it say that if you don't agree with this EULA, then simply destroy the software on the disk and be done with it.
The whole notion of taking software back for a refund dates from sometime ancient time when corporations had some sense of ethics. Just remove the "take it back" and "refund" clauses. Simply require you to destroy it.
The description of how his translator works is not all that different from the description that the Star Trek The Next Generation Technical Manual gives for the universal translator.
The ST:TNG tech manual says something about having to build up a "translation matrix" between the two languages. The UT is able to build this up by itself based on examples from the two languages. (It's been years since the read the ST:TNG Tech Manual. But this is about how I remember it.)
Yet another example of science fiction predicting technological fact.
While US funds the Total Information Awareness Agency, the German State funds Anonymity is not a crime
That is because we have not had our Police State experience yet. After the Untied Police States of America comes into being, and then eventually is overthrown, we will value things like anonymity. If we never have this experience, then we might instead just continue to have a gradual erosion of many rights. Of course, I suppose that eventually this would have to lead to the Unites Police States. The pendulum will probably have to swing fully one direction and then back.
They'd subpoena your weapon, and it would be up to you to show evidence that you didn't kill the cashier, 'cause they already have evidence that you did.
I agree they would subpoena your weapon.
I agree that they have evidence, but not that YOU did it.
I disagree that you would have to proove that you did not do it. The burden of proof is upon them to proove it. All you have to show is reasonable doubt.
And what has this to do with the orginal story ?
It is speculation. It is directly related to the original story.
If part of a multimedia system could be compromised by the actual media file it plays, then this could be a huge win for the RIAA.
Oh ! I get it ! Its' your average anti-microsoft junkie talk!
I'll admit that the notion that Microsoft might actually do this on purpose is all in fun. I don't seriously believe that they have done this.
But back to my first point, for a moment. Suppose that someone, let's say Microsoft, implemented a system where the media files played could compromise the system? And suppose that implementation were purposeful?
How is this speculation not on topic in this discussion?
Maybe security "flaws" in multimedia software are not a bug. They may be a wonderful Quality Protection feature brought to you by your good friends at Macrovision. Paid for by the RIAA.
Now the RIAA can put poisioned files onto P2P. But instead of just being annoying audio admonishing you not to steal, they can own your computer.
All they need is for it to be legal for them to hack your computer.
I simply refuse to believe it.
There is no way it is possible.
Even if a machine takes my order. I push the buttons. The display clearly shows what I ordered. I pay my money.
There is no way possible that they can ever dispense the correct change, nor dispense the actual food exactly as I ordered it.
IBM has, for a long time, had a crypto coprocessor card. Is this card subject to the patents?
The card is quite neat actually. I first learned of it on Slashdot.
Basic description...
Thousands of dollars. PCI card. It has a secret key inside. Thus it can sign things. You can communicate securely with it. It can securely generate a new secret key that can be securely transferred to another card elsewhere. (For instance, a master card generates a new key for all of my ATM's. It can encrypt the new key and then export it off the card. Couriers can carry the encrypted key to other cards. Only the processor on the crypto coprocessor in the ATM can actually decrypt the new key and know what the key is. Basically, no human EVER knows what the key is that is used between the ATM's and the master system.) The PCI card is tamperproof. It has a small metal box on it. Inside this box is a "blanket" of fine wire mesh. Batteries on the card power the crypto processor. The card detects tampering attempts and erases all of the secrets on the card. The purpose of the card is that it can know secrets that are truly secret, that is, the secret never exists outside of this card, or maybe only on this card and other similar cards, but never outside of a crypto coprocessor card. The card detects tampering of air pressure, electrical changes, radiation x-rays, etc.
Every time I think about TPM and DRM I think of this IBM card soldered to your motherboard. It has since become clear that TPM is not as tamperproof as this card. It provides high performance crypto functions in hardware, like this card, and has embedded "secrets" like this card, but those secrets could be extracted from the TPM on the motherboard by a dillegent effort.
One more interesting thing about IBM's crypto card. So how can you know that the secret key on the card is not known to IBM? Well IBM describes in a publicly downloadable PDF everything about the card, how it is manufactured, etc. (I read it before when I first learned of this card on slashdot). You buy 10 cards. Take 9 of them apart. See for yourself that the firmware inside the secure processor actually does secretly generate the key during manufacture and that everything works exactly as IBM says it does. Then take the 10th card and assume that it works the same way and that they key within it is truly a secret that is confined within the little metal box.
So is this covered by the patent? Owners of ATM's will not be happy.
Why is it necessary for all of Slashdot to have a single, consistent, die-hard view of things?
Because religious zealotry does not allow for a compromise position. This is especially true if you are still a baby and idealistic. (Early 20's or thereabouts.) Is this not obvious from observations of other religious fanatics?
>>It's the duty of a goverment to act for the benefit of all citizens
>By this I presume you mean all its own citizens
Um, excuse me, but...
Isn't it the duty of government to act in the best interest of its own corporations? Which is exactly what the US Government is doing.
- Telnet
- E-Mail
- FTP
- Usenet
Now sometimes, FTP was used to distribute copyright materials.My point, BitTorrent has legit uses. Just because it isn't being used that way doesn't mean it couldn't be. All it would take would be for someone major to decide that it is a great way to distribute some big project. Say, Red Hat. Say, OpenOffice. Say Mozilla.
Suppose movie trailers were distributed this way.
The percent of use of legit vs. non-legit is a red herring IMHO. Using your logic, the VCR would indeed have been banned, as the MPAA tried to do. Most people used it just to make unauthorized copies of copyright material. Hmmm.
So are we doomed to only have the forms of file distribution that are currently NOT being used for bad purposes? And if any mechanism, say the use of HTTP, becomes widespread as a mechanism to distribute copyright content without permission, should we ban it?
I'm just yanking your chain. Just a couple years ago I was a long, long time Mac user and strong advocate. A few years before that, I was a Mac developer.
But don't you agree that booting should be difficult? You should at least have to configure a complex boot loader that has many little things which can go wrong, making your system unbootable. Heaven forbid that the system can just boot off the right system folder, no matter where it is, and no matter what name it is given. Or that you could rename, and relocate the system folder without ever having to reboot. And on the next reboot, the same system folder will be booted from (even if you have multiple system folders, and some other one is now moved into the old location and given the old name).
Oh, shut up. Those silly Macs will try to boot off anything that even looks like it might have a filesystem.