His drooling over Gentoo? It's abundantly clear from his post and yours that he is many times more insightful and rational than you. His post says something meaningful as he describes the uses of various operating systems and concluding that Gentoo is not a good choice for servers, while you're just bashing Gentoo's policies and crying about Nethack.
Of course, this is slashdot, so you get the 'insightful' moderation. Congratulations.
Right. Actually, I don't see any functional difference at all between UAC and sudo. I dual-boot Linux and Vista. UAC pops up only when I want to install a program or update stuff. Sudo comes up when I want to install a program or update stuff. That's it. Vista gets a bad rap because "normal" users don't like the whole concept of UAC or sudo, because they just don't understand what's going on anyway. They just get annoyed by the interruption, so they think Vista is bad.
But for us technical users who understand why we need elevated privileges to install programs, update software, start/stop services, Vista (specifically because of UAC) is much better than XP because it's closer to Linux.
You're right from an objective, text book perspective. However, we can gain more insight in this situation if we follow the logic beyond the text book. Indeed, it becomes more subjective from here, but it's probably correct. The logic goes like this:
As long as the group of people who would buy music at a price greater than zero (but don't because they can get it easily for free online) does not contain zero people--I think we would both say that this is probably true--then an opportunity cost does exist, and there is a real loss associated with online piracy which is why the analogy and presumption of the OP is probably (most likely) not correct.
Hard to believe that subjectivity has a place in rational thinking.
As I've said before, the actual losses are zero. An opportunity cost only exists when an opportunity exists in the first place.
That might be a good point except for the fact that the opportunity does exist. You're probably assuming that all those who are inclined to steal would steal no matter what, therefore record labels aren't losing anything they had an opportunity to gain in the first place. Unfortunately, that assumption is wrong because the ease-of-use of the internet has made many people download content without paying who would otherwise not walk out of a retail store with an unpaid-for album. Therefore, the internet does increase piracy which increases "actual losses."
Wrong premise, but your conclusion is exactly correct. The reality is that the internet is here to stay, so record labels need to figure out how to survive, and crying about lost sales isn't nearly as useful as figuring out how to deal with it.
It's still irrelevant. Those who pirate have been able to convince themselves that downloading an album is not as wrong (if they consider it wrong at all) as taking a CD from a music shop without paying. Fine. It's still not relevant to the fact that the music itself is the product of recording companies, regardless of how it is distributed.
Wrong: the demand is vanishing. The astounding rise in consumer p2p reduces the demand for the physical CD, DVD, pay-for download, etc.
I'm surprised anyone considers this insightful. It's actually quite ridiculous since it should be clear that the product of recording companies is the music, not the method of distribution. Demand for music certainly is not vanishing.
As an owner of an iPod touch (using it with iTunes on Windows Vista of all things), let me just say that I have no idea what you're talking about. It's funny how we can both be using the same product and have completely different experiences.
I do not find the iPod sluggish at all, nor do applications crash ever. I find Mail to be relatively intuitive, although different than other clients. There is a document viewer (pdf, word, etc), maybe you mean there is no document editor; that's a valid complaint, although not for me since I personally have no desire to edit documents on such a small device.
If you really have such problems with your iPod touch, I am more inclined to think that you are the exception since most people I know thoroughly enjoy theirs and definitely do not have such problems. Maybe you got a bad one? *shrugs*
More precisely, AT&T doesn't like it, and Apple doesn't want to deal with allowing foreign iPhone users on different carriers who allow tethering to be able to download a tethering app when We The People cannot. It's easier for them to forbid it for everybody.
Also, for accuracy, it's possible to do tethering without jailbreaking. There are other ways to get your apps on the iPhone other than through their App Store that also do not require jailbreaking...
That said, I find tethering good and useful, and I might look forwarding to buying in iPhone if/when Apple drops AT&T exclusivity.
Why should she be indicted? None of her emails were very inappropriate.
What we have is some people who thought that Palin was conducting official state business on her personal account, and for some reason, even though her personal emails have been exposed and cleared as appropriate, they still can't drop their belief that she was/is conducting state business on her personal account.
Let it go--she obviously wasn't, and we know that thanks to the idiot who accessed her emails.
Doesn't matter to me. The whole award means a lot less since even Gore was able to secure one with little but political rhetoric.
Moderators: I've got karma to burn, but consider that Gore is still a politician who hardly practices what he is preaching. I'm all for preserving Earth, but come on...
And that is the fundamental, philosophical difference between those who back the BSD/MIT-style licenses and those who are stuck on the GPL.
We don't care if corporations take our project and run with it. The more places our project can used, the better. To us, writing code isn't religion. We do it for fun, and we want our work to be usable and helpful to the most people possible. We're chill. If you modify our code, you can send back your changes. Don't want to give back? That's cool, too. We give our code away with no strings attached to maximize our utility, and to maximize the usefulness of the code. Our license is easily understood by non-lawyer types and has maximum compatibility with other Free software licenses. By keeping it simple and compatible, we avoid boring rewrites and promote sharing. It's great here.
The issue here is not the license, because we can assume that since the original authors of the project used the BSD license that they agree with the ideals I laid out. The real issue seems to be the non-competition clause of the company's proposed contract, not the BSD license.
I seems you ignored his point. It is still true that most of the support was from the democratic side. While it is sad that a pork-laden bill was able to pass while the original, cleaner bill couldn't, it's more sad to me that all along the democrats were so eager to accept this huge spending bill without even really understanding it.
As has been noted, why would foreigners object to the bill? It's not their money being spent, yet they will certainly profit. The bailing out being done in some other countries is hardly comparable to this thing.
Haha, busted. More likely, he's 26, still has acne, and is living in his mother's basement. I'm just wondering why he thinks bragging about MS certifications would put him in a positive light...
And it was evil of Apple to break hacking iPhones restricting user freedom.
The problem with this is that Apple hasn't prevented hacking the iPhone except to patch the security patches used by jailbreak apps. What else can they do; leave the insecurities there? You can probably see how this wouldn't be a possibility for them.
The problem is not that Apple patched their software. The problem was that they had no API when everyone wanted to develop apps. That is now a moot point. The real issue is simply that Apple requires $99 and their approval for 3rd parties to distribute apps on their store. What they should do is come up with some way that people can put whatever they want on their phones and perhaps allow iPhones apps to be downloaded outside of their store.
From Wikipedia: "A smartphone is a mobile phone offering advanced capabilities beyond a typical mobile phone, often with PC-like functionality."
I don't see how the term has to be redefined to include the iPhone since it refers to a phones' capabilities rather than software licenses and implementations. Looks like you're the one trying to redefine the term...
It is already possible with the iPhone. (Google it.) Currently, it is not sanctioned by Apple (especially in the US) because of our good friends at AT&T and their crappy network. I look forward to the day that Apple drops AT&T exclusivity.
I used to be a Mac; now I'm a Penguin. I like the Seinfeld ads, and I like this one, too. It won't be effective against me because I know that I'll never go with Windows, and I don't know how effective it will be at taking back new "Macs," but if anything I think it will at least provide a confidence boost to those remaining Windows users who may have started feeling "unhip" or something since the Apple ads have been playing.
Regardless, it is certainly effective in undermining the stereotype that Apple has built. In a way, it lets the cat out of the bag: I think many people will look at the first scene and realize, regardless of what computer they use, that they have built a stereotype of PC based on Apple's ads. There will probably be a backlash.
I don't see how Apple's Mac and PC ads can ever been nearly as effective ever again. I think they will have to be retired really soon, and it will be interesting to see what else they'll come up with.
You say that there was no SEC regulation, and that's true. Unfortunately, you have assumed that absence of regulation has been "laissez-faire" (and that it failed), but that is not true.
What we have had has not been proper regulation, but it has not been "laissez-faire" either because the politicians have been butting in and urging the big boys on Wall Street to make money available to people who couldn't afford their houses! That was the point which I made. As you can see, that's not laissez-faire; that's government meddling with the markets as usual, but this time in a form that isn't regulation.
So you see, we both agree with each other that there hasn't been proper regulation, but it's unfair to say that "laissez-faire" has failed when it hasn't even really been applied.
I mean, think about it. It's no coincidence that all of these huge firms which have lasted decades upon decades and have withstood countless trials, including the Great Depression, are now all failing at the same time right now. Under a "laissez-faire" market, that would be one big coincidence.
So the major lenders are easily swayed by suggestion? Some how this doesn't sound quite right unless all the major lenders are managed by complete financial idiots.
The magnitude that I intended for the word urged is considerably more than mere suggestion.
I also don't mean to downplay the greed of Wall Street executives either. It would be overly simplistic to say that the blame rests entirely on politicians, and that was not my intent. Clearly, the top executives had the choice, and (like you said) they saw the possibility of increased profits. They gambled and lost to the detriment of us all.
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His drooling over Gentoo? It's abundantly clear from his post and yours that he is many times more insightful and rational than you. His post says something meaningful as he describes the uses of various operating systems and concluding that Gentoo is not a good choice for servers, while you're just bashing Gentoo's policies and crying about Nethack.
Of course, this is slashdot, so you get the 'insightful' moderation. Congratulations.
Right. Actually, I don't see any functional difference at all between UAC and sudo. I dual-boot Linux and Vista. UAC pops up only when I want to install a program or update stuff. Sudo comes up when I want to install a program or update stuff. That's it. Vista gets a bad rap because "normal" users don't like the whole concept of UAC or sudo, because they just don't understand what's going on anyway. They just get annoyed by the interruption, so they think Vista is bad.
But for us technical users who understand why we need elevated privileges to install programs, update software, start/stop services, Vista (specifically because of UAC) is much better than XP because it's closer to Linux.
You're right from an objective, text book perspective. However, we can gain more insight in this situation if we follow the logic beyond the text book. Indeed, it becomes more subjective from here, but it's probably correct. The logic goes like this:
As long as the group of people who would buy music at a price greater than zero (but don't because they can get it easily for free online) does not contain zero people--I think we would both say that this is probably true--then an opportunity cost does exist, and there is a real loss associated with online piracy which is why the analogy and presumption of the OP is probably (most likely) not correct.
Hard to believe that subjectivity has a place in rational thinking.
As I've said before, the actual losses are zero. An opportunity cost only exists when an opportunity exists in the first place.
That might be a good point except for the fact that the opportunity does exist. You're probably assuming that all those who are inclined to steal would steal no matter what, therefore record labels aren't losing anything they had an opportunity to gain in the first place. Unfortunately, that assumption is wrong because the ease-of-use of the internet has made many people download content without paying who would otherwise not walk out of a retail store with an unpaid-for album. Therefore, the internet does increase piracy which increases "actual losses."
Wrong premise, but your conclusion is exactly correct. The reality is that the internet is here to stay, so record labels need to figure out how to survive, and crying about lost sales isn't nearly as useful as figuring out how to deal with it.
How that content is delivered is secondary.
Obviously not for those who pirate...
It's still irrelevant. Those who pirate have been able to convince themselves that downloading an album is not as wrong (if they consider it wrong at all) as taking a CD from a music shop without paying. Fine. It's still not relevant to the fact that the music itself is the product of recording companies, regardless of how it is distributed.
Wrong: the demand is vanishing. The astounding rise in consumer p2p reduces the demand for the physical CD, DVD, pay-for download, etc.
I'm surprised anyone considers this insightful. It's actually quite ridiculous since it should be clear that the product of recording companies is the music, not the method of distribution. Demand for music certainly is not vanishing.
As an owner of an iPod touch (using it with iTunes on Windows Vista of all things), let me just say that I have no idea what you're talking about. It's funny how we can both be using the same product and have completely different experiences.
I do not find the iPod sluggish at all, nor do applications crash ever. I find Mail to be relatively intuitive, although different than other clients. There is a document viewer (pdf, word, etc), maybe you mean there is no document editor; that's a valid complaint, although not for me since I personally have no desire to edit documents on such a small device.
If you really have such problems with your iPod touch, I am more inclined to think that you are the exception since most people I know thoroughly enjoy theirs and definitely do not have such problems. Maybe you got a bad one? *shrugs*
More precisely, AT&T doesn't like it, and Apple doesn't want to deal with allowing foreign iPhone users on different carriers who allow tethering to be able to download a tethering app when We The People cannot. It's easier for them to forbid it for everybody.
Also, for accuracy, it's possible to do tethering without jailbreaking. There are other ways to get your apps on the iPhone other than through their App Store that also do not require jailbreaking...
That said, I find tethering good and useful, and I might look forwarding to buying in iPhone if/when Apple drops AT&T exclusivity.
As pointed out already, they did patent it at NeXT. Just FYI.
Why should she be indicted? None of her emails were very inappropriate.
What we have is some people who thought that Palin was conducting official state business on her personal account, and for some reason, even though her personal emails have been exposed and cleared as appropriate, they still can't drop their belief that she was/is conducting state business on her personal account.
Let it go--she obviously wasn't, and we know that thanks to the idiot who accessed her emails.
Doesn't matter to me. The whole award means a lot less since even Gore was able to secure one with little but political rhetoric.
Moderators: I've got karma to burn, but consider that Gore is still a politician who hardly practices what he is preaching. I'm all for preserving Earth, but come on...
Exactly. To me, the only thing interesting in this story is how fickle AAPL is. Good to know, if there was any doubt to begin with...
And that is the fundamental, philosophical difference between those who back the BSD/MIT-style licenses and those who are stuck on the GPL.
We don't care if corporations take our project and run with it. The more places our project can used, the better. To us, writing code isn't religion. We do it for fun, and we want our work to be usable and helpful to the most people possible. We're chill. If you modify our code, you can send back your changes. Don't want to give back? That's cool, too. We give our code away with no strings attached to maximize our utility, and to maximize the usefulness of the code. Our license is easily understood by non-lawyer types and has maximum compatibility with other Free software licenses. By keeping it simple and compatible, we avoid boring rewrites and promote sharing. It's great here.
The issue here is not the license, because we can assume that since the original authors of the project used the BSD license that they agree with the ideals I laid out. The real issue seems to be the non-competition clause of the company's proposed contract, not the BSD license.
I seems you ignored his point. It is still true that most of the support was from the democratic side. While it is sad that a pork-laden bill was able to pass while the original, cleaner bill couldn't, it's more sad to me that all along the democrats were so eager to accept this huge spending bill without even really understanding it.
As has been noted, why would foreigners object to the bill? It's not their money being spent, yet they will certainly profit. The bailing out being done in some other countries is hardly comparable to this thing.
Haha, busted. More likely, he's 26, still has acne, and is living in his mother's basement. I'm just wondering why he thinks bragging about MS certifications would put him in a positive light...
And it was evil of Apple to break hacking iPhones restricting user freedom.
The problem with this is that Apple hasn't prevented hacking the iPhone except to patch the security patches used by jailbreak apps. What else can they do; leave the insecurities there? You can probably see how this wouldn't be a possibility for them.
The problem is not that Apple patched their software. The problem was that they had no API when everyone wanted to develop apps. That is now a moot point. The real issue is simply that Apple requires $99 and their approval for 3rd parties to distribute apps on their store. What they should do is come up with some way that people can put whatever they want on their phones and perhaps allow iPhones apps to be downloaded outside of their store.
From Wikipedia: "A smartphone is a mobile phone offering advanced capabilities beyond a typical mobile phone, often with PC-like functionality."
I don't see how the term has to be redefined to include the iPhone since it refers to a phones' capabilities rather than software licenses and implementations. Looks like you're the one trying to redefine the term...
...than I get on my wired LAN.
AFAIK Apple just took kHTML and renamed it to Webkit
If this statement is true, then the rest of your post is true and valid. As it turns out, none of it is true. WebKit is much more than khtml was.
This is not possible with either!
It is already possible with the iPhone. (Google it.) Currently, it is not sanctioned by Apple (especially in the US) because of our good friends at AT&T and their crappy network. I look forward to the day that Apple drops AT&T exclusivity.
I'll even add a free software example: ALSA.
I used to be a Mac; now I'm a Penguin. I like the Seinfeld ads, and I like this one, too. It won't be effective against me because I know that I'll never go with Windows, and I don't know how effective it will be at taking back new "Macs," but if anything I think it will at least provide a confidence boost to those remaining Windows users who may have started feeling "unhip" or something since the Apple ads have been playing.
Regardless, it is certainly effective in undermining the stereotype that Apple has built. In a way, it lets the cat out of the bag: I think many people will look at the first scene and realize, regardless of what computer they use, that they have built a stereotype of PC based on Apple's ads. There will probably be a backlash.
I don't see how Apple's Mac and PC ads can ever been nearly as effective ever again. I think they will have to be retired really soon, and it will be interesting to see what else they'll come up with.
You say that there was no SEC regulation, and that's true. Unfortunately, you have assumed that absence of regulation has been "laissez-faire" (and that it failed), but that is not true.
What we have had has not been proper regulation, but it has not been "laissez-faire" either because the politicians have been butting in and urging the big boys on Wall Street to make money available to people who couldn't afford their houses! That was the point which I made. As you can see, that's not laissez-faire; that's government meddling with the markets as usual, but this time in a form that isn't regulation.
So you see, we both agree with each other that there hasn't been proper regulation, but it's unfair to say that "laissez-faire" has failed when it hasn't even really been applied.
I mean, think about it. It's no coincidence that all of these huge firms which have lasted decades upon decades and have withstood countless trials, including the Great Depression, are now all failing at the same time right now. Under a "laissez-faire" market, that would be one big coincidence.
So the major lenders are easily swayed by suggestion? Some how this doesn't sound quite right unless all the major lenders are managed by complete financial idiots.
The magnitude that I intended for the word urged is considerably more than mere suggestion.
I also don't mean to downplay the greed of Wall Street executives either. It would be overly simplistic to say that the blame rests entirely on politicians, and that was not my intent. Clearly, the top executives had the choice, and (like you said) they saw the possibility of increased profits. They gambled and lost to the detriment of us all.