This is a copy of what I sent to CNet (I'm being lazy):
Reading your review of Opera, and I must say I'm confused as to just how I could be viewing Java applets in Opera 4.02 if Opera 4 doesn't support Java. The fact is that single largest improvement in Opera 4.x is the automatic enabling of the local Java environment. You probably downloaded the small browser and had no local Java Runtime Environment.
In addition, using the Netscape plugin, you can run Active-X programs, but *WHY* would you want to do that? Active-X is a single-platform security nightmare that doesn't offer anything particularly useful.
That is only used to date organic compounds. Plus, C-14 dating isn't terribly useful at measuring the geological age of stuff when it's a couple hundred million years old (I forget the exact amount). We use much different dating methods for that.
Now, those methods could be wrong, but no one has been able to disprove carbon dating, or K-dating, or U-dating, or any of the other methods to date minerals.
I can see it now. "Well, God only made Earth look really old. He didn't spend as much effort making Mars look old. Really, they're both only 6000 years old and this hundred-million years is a facade made to trap the satanic atheists."
(Modified only slightly from an actual IRC quote).
In federal court, jurisdiction does not determine where the ruling is binding, but where the hearing is held. Likewise, in a state court, the jurisdiction determines where in the state a case is held, but it does not bind the results of the case to that specific area.
I get what you're driving at with your second point, but what about the times when someone is responsible and it's not a case of someone trying to make a quick buck?
I say we need should start something along the lines of damage mitigation with immediate disclosure and remedy attempts, though. Possibly punative damages can't result from when a company has publically and effectively acknowledged a defect. Immediate effects (like hospital bills, etc) can be sued to recover, but not punative damages.
There really isn't a jurisdiction in terms of where in the country you are to a federal law, and likewise the same applies to the decisions of a court.
Basically, Kaplan screwed up by not declaring the DMCA illegal (yes, he is allowed to do that) and by not excusing himself due to bias.
Makes me wonder if we shouldn't go about creating another option for judges to exercise: "No law for this" which punts the decision straight to the appropriate legislative body to create a law.
Why is it the worst security hole ever when it happened in Piranna, but nothing when it happens in SQL Server? That is the point. The press jumped all over the "backdoor" RH had, but don't touch SQL server despite it being a more dangerous configuration.
Truth in advertising laws are why you get/got the fine print at the bottom of doll commercials saying "this doll doesn't actually walk or talk." Actually, nowdays, you don't even get that, and just see kids playing with dolls because people won lawsuits under truth in advertising laws because kids couldn't be expected to read the tiny print.
Most DSL companies I've looked at will, in fact, offer you higher (and guaranteed) bandwidth, but you have to pay through the nose (because otherwise you end up competing for their T1 services)
SWBell is advertising "up to 384 Kbps rates," but if you are never capable of achieving the advertised rates, then that is illegal, just as if SWBell advertised "up to 150 Mbps transfer." If you advertise a something, there must be a reasonable expectation of being able to achieve that.
(I was being sarcastic in my first response, BTW).
If you really are looking at systems because you like them, fine. But if you go looking for alternates strictly because people say "RedHat is the only rational distribution" then that doesn't make any sense.
Only one court has the *FINAL SAY* in whether something is unconstitutional or not. And furthermore, Kaplan is a federal judge. You may have a valid point if this was in state court, but it isn't. It's in federal court.
I said it above, but the judicial branch of the government, at all levels, can make the claim that a law is unconstitutional. They can't pass claim on whether the law should be there or not from a "good law/bad law" standpoint, but from a "legal law/illegal law", they have no real restrictions.
This is an illegal law, and hopefully the S.C. will realize that.
It is not the sole perview of the supreme court to determine constitutionality. Any judge can claim something is not constitutional. Very few do that because they are afraid to go against what the supreme court may later find.
But there are also advantages to a file manager. It's a matter of using the appropriate tool rather than becoming so stuck on a single tool that you can't learn anything different.
Whether you like KDE (I do) or not (I still prefer Gnome:), you have to acknowledge that QT causes problems, especially for Sun and other commercial vendors. They cannot be expected to limit themselves to the whims of a third party of which they have zero control over.
There are two mutually exclusive complaints here and there is no hypocracy involved.
On the one hand, you have people talking about the architecture of the system. Win95 is not a true 32-bit OS, neither is Win98 *OR* WinME. This means you still run into problems with applications being able to scribble in parts they shouldn't. They still have a single path to the display layer, and so forth.
It's important to realize that *NONE* of this has been fixed. If you want a pure 32-bit OS from Microsoft, you need to get W2K.
The other complaint is that they have now made it next to impossible (until someone figures out a way to do it) to get back to a pure DOS session so you can use loadlin or similar tools. No, this isn't a "problem" to people already using LILO/GRUB/(insert other boot loader), but people using loadlin to start their boxes can't use WinME.
Slashdot Mirror
Funny, yes, but "informative"???
--
Ben Kosse
This is a copy of what I sent to CNet (I'm being lazy):
Reading your review of Opera, and I must say I'm confused as to just how I could be viewing Java applets in Opera 4.02 if Opera 4 doesn't support Java. The fact is that single largest improvement in Opera 4.x is the automatic enabling of the local Java environment. You probably downloaded the small browser and had no local Java Runtime Environment.
In addition, using the Netscape plugin, you can run Active-X programs, but *WHY* would you want to do that? Active-X is a single-platform security nightmare that doesn't offer anything particularly useful.
--
Ben Kosse
That is only used to date organic compounds. Plus, C-14 dating isn't terribly useful at measuring the geological age of stuff when it's a couple hundred million years old (I forget the exact amount). We use much different dating methods for that.
Now, those methods could be wrong, but no one has been able to disprove carbon dating, or K-dating, or U-dating, or any of the other methods to date minerals.
--
Ben Kosse
I can see it now. "Well, God only made Earth look really old. He didn't spend as much effort making Mars look old. Really, they're both only 6000 years old and this hundred-million years is a facade made to trap the satanic atheists."
(Modified only slightly from an actual IRC quote).
--
Ben Kosse
In federal court, jurisdiction does not determine where the ruling is binding, but where the hearing is held. Likewise, in a state court, the jurisdiction determines where in the state a case is held, but it does not bind the results of the case to that specific area.
--
Ben Kosse
I get what you're driving at with your second point, but what about the times when someone is responsible and it's not a case of someone trying to make a quick buck? I say we need should start something along the lines of damage mitigation with immediate disclosure and remedy attempts, though. Possibly punative damages can't result from when a company has publically and effectively acknowledged a defect. Immediate effects (like hospital bills, etc) can be sued to recover, but not punative damages.
--
Ben Kosse
There really isn't a jurisdiction in terms of where in the country you are to a federal law, and likewise the same applies to the decisions of a court.
Basically, Kaplan screwed up by not declaring the DMCA illegal (yes, he is allowed to do that) and by not excusing himself due to bias.
--
Ben Kosse
Read the Vital Books site. They specifically say you are not allowed to lend your VitalViewer or VitalBook to anyone.
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Ben Kosse
And he set one here.
Makes me wonder if we shouldn't go about creating another option for judges to exercise: "No law for this" which punts the decision straight to the appropriate legislative body to create a law.
--
Ben Kosse
Why is it the worst security hole ever when it happened in Piranna, but nothing when it happens in SQL Server? That is the point. The press jumped all over the "backdoor" RH had, but don't touch SQL server despite it being a more dangerous configuration.
--
Ben Kosse
Truth in advertising laws are why you get/got the fine print at the bottom of doll commercials saying "this doll doesn't actually walk or talk." Actually, nowdays, you don't even get that, and just see kids playing with dolls because people won lawsuits under truth in advertising laws because kids couldn't be expected to read the tiny print.
--
Ben Kosse
Most DSL companies I've looked at will, in fact, offer you higher (and guaranteed) bandwidth, but you have to pay through the nose (because otherwise you end up competing for their T1 services)
--
Ben Kosse
SWBell is advertising "up to 384 Kbps rates," but if you are never capable of achieving the advertised rates, then that is illegal, just as if SWBell advertised "up to 150 Mbps transfer." If you advertise a something, there must be a reasonable expectation of being able to achieve that.
--
Ben Kosse
(I was being sarcastic in my first response, BTW).
If you really are looking at systems because you like them, fine. But if you go looking for alternates strictly because people say "RedHat is the only rational distribution" then that doesn't make any sense.
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Ben Kosse
That makes a whole lot of sense there. Why are you even using Linux? Shouldn't you be using something not often used like OS/2 or Eros or something?
--
Ben Kosse
Only one court has the *FINAL SAY* in whether something is unconstitutional or not. And furthermore, Kaplan is a federal judge. You may have a valid point if this was in state court, but it isn't. It's in federal court.
--
Ben Kosse
This is an illegal law, and hopefully the S.C. will realize that.
--
Ben Kosse
It is not the sole perview of the supreme court to determine constitutionality. Any judge can claim something is not constitutional. Very few do that because they are afraid to go against what the supreme court may later find.
--
Ben Kosse
But there are also advantages to a file manager. It's a matter of using the appropriate tool rather than becoming so stuck on a single tool that you can't learn anything different.
--
Ben Kosse
Check that. If so, try benchmarking on an Alpha system rather than an Intel box.
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Ben Kosse
Moderators, start stocking up on your points, because it'll get ugly.
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Ben Kosse
Whether you like KDE (I do) or not (I still prefer Gnome :), you have to acknowledge that QT causes problems, especially for Sun and other commercial vendors. They cannot be expected to limit themselves to the whims of a third party of which they have zero control over.
--
Ben Kosse
I don't know about the rest, but anything in Gnome proper seems to be (L)GPLed.
--
Ben Kosse
I have movement bound to the mouse (mouse 1 is backward, mouse 2 is forward, mouselook enabled fulltime) and keyboard (jump, crouch and strafing).
I never turn on/off mouse look, because it is always enabled, so, really, there is no issue of a shift.
There are two mutually exclusive complaints here and there is no hypocracy involved.
On the one hand, you have people talking about the architecture of the system. Win95 is not a true 32-bit OS, neither is Win98 *OR* WinME. This means you still run into problems with applications being able to scribble in parts they shouldn't. They still have a single path to the display layer, and so forth.
It's important to realize that *NONE* of this has been fixed. If you want a pure 32-bit OS from Microsoft, you need to get W2K.
The other complaint is that they have now made it next to impossible (until someone figures out a way to do it) to get back to a pure DOS session so you can use loadlin or similar tools. No, this isn't a "problem" to people already using LILO/GRUB/(insert other boot loader), but people using loadlin to start their boxes can't use WinME.