First, let's ask what role adventure plays in life? For many of us, it's important. For some, it's crucial. Without adventure, for many people, what's the point? Would Van Allen really prefer a nation of couch potatoes?
But eth final sentence really got me.
"Let us not obfuscate the issue with false analogies to Christopher Columbus, Ferdinand Magellan, and Lewis and Clark, or with visions of establishing a pleasant tourist resort on the planet Mars," van Allen suggests.
Why on earth would these be considered obfuscations? Especially the explorers! You can learn a lot via robot, but there are some things you just won't learn that way. Especially if we run across any form of life much more advanced than a simple, single-cell form.
With all due respect, perhaps Mr. Van Allen is simply getting too old. Typically, age brings less concern for adventure and more concern for safety and.... dare I say it? things not changing. I'm not saying this is all that's at work behind his arguments, but I suspect it is a factor.
yes, with age also comes (hopefully) wisdom. But with age we can also have ossification. The best results usually arrive when we have a balance of maturity, wisdom and caution with adventuresomeness, exhuberance and boldness.
That was my first reaction upon reading the opening sentence on/. - reading the article didn't change it one bit.
Correction to the OP's assertion that this is what the GH CEO thinks. We have no iea what he really thinks about this; we only know what he says. And what he says seems as likely to be about protecting GH's interest as protecting the national interest.
I'm not accusing him of being treacherous or anything. I don't doubt that he thinks GH software is good, and therefore good for the nation, you, me, our families, pets, neighbors, fire ants, and everyone else.
And he could really think what you think he thinks, but there's no way to know from this article. It just tells us what he says.
That woks out to about.009 oz of plutonium and.8 liters of radioactive waste per US citizen. As a taxpayer, I want my plutonium and radioactive waste! Where do I sent my request?
1. "If you're not willing to help fix it then you shouldn't complain about it"
I mostly agree. When I first started using an OSS OS, I tried to use BSD, because I knew it. But I already had the hardware, and nobody had drivers for it. While I was a developer, I had very little time to get this system up and running; writing a SCSI driver was not an option. Nor was there time to pay someone else to fix it. I went with Linux.
I agree, people should help where they can. I have worked on OSS projects. I buy a copy of any Linux distro I use, to help pay for development. But to expect my wife and kids (all of whom use Linux just fine) to help fix problems (beyond reporting them) is *utterly* luidcrous.
2. "Open Source software allows you to get under the hood and fix problems"
Yes, it does. And that's great. I've done it at times; others I have not. But again, my wife and kids sure won't. Neither will my parents or any of my siblings except one.
3. "All software should be free"
WHY?
I know this is the mantra. It has been for years. And I still don't buy it (sic). This is purely a philosphical (religious for some) debate. I have never seen any really solid reasons for this. It generally boils down to "I believe". That's fine, go ahead and believe. But recognize that's what you're dealing with.
Don't even get me started on the "software/information wants to be free" crap. Neither software nor information want anything. There are arguments for both free software and software for sale. I'm glad we have both, as a rule.
As far as the related arguments go-- that we should only pay for a service, or for software for hire, and everything else should be free-- again, I have seen no compelling arguments. It's purely a war of philosphies. In many ways, it's like a microcosm of the communist vs capitalist cold war.
In summary, this is one of the most preposterous statements to come out of the high tech arena since the dawn of the computer age.
4. "Open Source software is always better than closed, proprietary software"
Well said. VMS was closed and proprietary, and it was one of the best OSes ever developed.
5. "Scratching the personal itch"
I both agree and disagree. The fact is that many developers have interests other than development. Two of the best software packages for Windows I have used are free; a power supply designer and a tone stack calculator for guitar amps and similar things.
6. "More choice is always better"
I can't think of much to add, here. This is one of the single, biggest problems. People don't want choices in things they don't understand. And they don't want to have to be educated just to make the choices.
One of the errors I often see is people confusing "anarchy" with "chaos". They two do not equate. There is no assumption of disorder or destruction with anarchy, unlike chaos. Anarchy is simply the individual choosing rather than having those choices made for them.
In the real world, there's little difference. Sooner or later, someone will make a choice that relieves you of a choice-- robbery, rape, murder, etc.
One could argue what point Mr. Niven was trying to make, but when I read it, I was well into being an anarchist, and that story started me on the road out.
While it's possible you are correct, it seems also at least as feasible that they were making money from licenses. In that case, they'd have ha dto give up the revenues from the final year or two, or face legal action by licensees. Regarless of the merits of such cases, it probably would have cost more to fight the battles than they made from licenses. Since they were off most peoples' radar screens, they simply chose to keep the status quo. After all, it was making money!
Not really! I'm simply quite jealous. That sounds like just about the coolest way to grow up there is. When I was a kid in the 60s, I dreamed of one day growing up to fly in spaceships, walk on other planets, and perhaps die exploring space or defending earth. I used to design spaceships.
When we failed to follow up the Apollo program, when Vietnam and the whole hippie thing with the anti0military-industrial-complex went down, the magic died, and we as a nation lost the vision.
I no longer expect to set foot on another planet, but I am beginning to hope that some day before I die, I can at least get into space and see the beauty there for myself.
By getting the site slashdotted, they assured that the images will live for quite some time on millions of PCs and proxies around the world.
Once the data finally gets through. It feels like they're serving the images off the poor little IBM with core memory that ran the Apollo 11 mission, via a 110 baud acosutic coupler!
My kids went to a private school. The school mostly had Macs so old you could see Eve's teeth marks on the apple. A company donated their old PCs running W98, that were at least newer than the (abysmally slow) Apples, and "Voila!" - an all Windows school. (I think the guy who corrdinated the donation helped convert all the data, too.)
I'm amazed the judge hasn't had the bailiffs toss SCO into the street, then bury them under their own paperwork. I would have. I'd also have invoked the frivolous lawsuit fines, and started thinking out loud about piercing the corporate veil.
First off, you apparently assume that the only issue is sound reproduction when you speak of distortion not occuring under normal circumstances. And while it happens even there, the huge world of naturally-occuring distortion is guitar amplifiers.
And there are darned few SS amps that even get close to sounding like good tube amps. Distortion is the biggest area, but there are others, as well.
Does everyone like tube amps? No. Does everyone need a tube amp? No. Are they different? Yes. Are they better? That's up to the individual. But a huge number of individuals prefer tube guitar amps for overdriven sounds, even in blind tests.
I grew up on tubes. Like everyone else, I abandoned them in the 60s. Like a lot of other folks, I eventually realized that some of the sounds I wanted simply weren't there with solid state amps. Will they ever be? I have no idea. But they aren't today.
There are some obvious, immediate benefits with issues like this. Systems can more quickly route around outages and DDOS attacks.
However, I'm highly suspect that Verisign came up with this idea without some self-interest at the heart of it.
Hmmm. Seems like having things reroute better around DDOS attacks *is* in their own self interest.
Also, other have mentioned that competitors already have this. So it's in Verisign's self interest to have it as well, so they don't lose customers (maybe even gain some).
The first point is obviously good for all of us, the second certainly doesn't hurt us.
And this would be worse than the current situation where it takes forever to get IE fixed, and most people don't have a clue what's on their computer.... how?
Either that or the poster's too dumb to trust with a loaded computer. Or a Bill Gates sycophant. Those ar eth eobvious explanations (to me) for someone who'd accuse someone else of not using a browser, but who then cliams to use a browser they obviously didn't attempt to understand.
Yeah, my first thought, too. StorageTek is officially off the list of vendors I'll consider for our backup needs. But hey, it's just a few filers, what do they care?
A few filers here, a few filers there, pretty soon you're talking about their whole market.
OK, so it's been since the 80s in Atlanta since I've been in a VAX environment (sniff).
But that *was* the typical VAX support guy who showed up. White shirt, dark tie, short hair. You have to remember, their main target was companies who wished they could afford IBM, or who wanted to get away from IBM, or at the very least other, traditional computing environments.
It probably also matters where you are. Today, in Atlanta, I'd still expect the guy to look pretty much the same. If he showed up in Austin looking like that, except *maybe* at a bank, everyone would figure he was a singing telegram joke or a terrorist!
Slashdot Mirror
First, let's ask what role adventure plays in life? For many of us, it's important. For some, it's crucial. Without adventure, for many people, what's the point? Would Van Allen really prefer a nation of couch potatoes?
But eth final sentence really got me.
"Let us not obfuscate the issue with false analogies to Christopher Columbus, Ferdinand Magellan, and Lewis and Clark, or with visions of establishing a pleasant tourist resort on the planet Mars," van Allen suggests.
Why on earth would these be considered obfuscations? Especially the explorers! You can learn a lot via robot, but there are some things you just won't learn that way. Especially if we run across any form of life much more advanced than a simple, single-cell form.
With all due respect, perhaps Mr. Van Allen is simply getting too old. Typically, age brings less concern for adventure and more concern for safety and.... dare I say it? things not changing. I'm not saying this is all that's at work behind his arguments, but I suspect it is a factor.
yes, with age also comes (hopefully) wisdom. But with age we can also have ossification. The best results usually arrive when we have a balance of maturity, wisdom and caution with adventuresomeness, exhuberance and boldness.
That was my first reaction upon reading the opening sentence on /. - reading the article didn't change it one bit.
Correction to the OP's assertion that this is what the GH CEO thinks. We have no iea what he really thinks about this; we only know what he says. And what he says seems as likely to be about protecting GH's interest as protecting the national interest.
I'm not accusing him of being treacherous or anything. I don't doubt that he thinks GH software is good, and therefore good for the nation, you, me, our families, pets, neighbors, fire ants, and everyone else.
And he could really think what you think he thinks, but there's no way to know from this article. It just tells us what he says.
That woks out to about .009 oz of plutonium and .8 liters of radioactive waste per US citizen. As a taxpayer, I want my plutonium and radioactive waste! Where do I sent my request?
1. "If you're not willing to help fix it then you shouldn't complain about it"
I mostly agree. When I first started using an OSS OS, I tried to use BSD, because I knew it. But I already had the hardware, and nobody had drivers for it. While I was a developer, I had very little time to get this system up and running; writing a SCSI driver was not an option. Nor was there time to pay someone else to fix it. I went with Linux.
I agree, people should help where they can. I have worked on OSS projects. I buy a copy of any Linux distro I use, to help pay for development. But to expect my wife and kids (all of whom use Linux just fine) to help fix problems (beyond reporting them) is *utterly* luidcrous.
2. "Open Source software allows you to get under the hood and fix problems"
Yes, it does. And that's great. I've done it at times; others I have not. But again, my wife and kids sure won't. Neither will my parents or any of my siblings except one.
3. "All software should be free"
WHY?
I know this is the mantra. It has been for years. And I still don't buy it (sic). This is purely a philosphical (religious for some) debate. I have never seen any really solid reasons for this. It generally boils down to "I believe". That's fine, go ahead and believe. But recognize that's what you're dealing with.
Don't even get me started on the "software/information wants to be free" crap. Neither software nor information want anything. There are arguments for both free software and software for sale. I'm glad we have both, as a rule.
As far as the related arguments go-- that we should only pay for a service, or for software for hire, and everything else should be free-- again, I have seen no compelling arguments. It's purely a war of philosphies. In many ways, it's like a microcosm of the communist vs capitalist cold war.
In summary, this is one of the most preposterous statements to come out of the high tech arena since the dawn of the computer age.
4. "Open Source software is always better than closed, proprietary software"
Well said. VMS was closed and proprietary, and it was one of the best OSes ever developed.
5. "Scratching the personal itch"
I both agree and disagree. The fact is that many developers have interests other than development. Two of the best software packages for Windows I have used are free; a power supply designer and a tone stack calculator for guitar amps and similar things.
6. "More choice is always better"
I can't think of much to add, here. This is one of the single, biggest problems. People don't want choices in things they don't understand. And they don't want to have to be educated just to make the choices.
7. Conclusion: It's Not So Simple"
And how.
Great job, Neil.
One of the errors I often see is people confusing "anarchy" with "chaos". They two do not equate. There is no assumption of disorder or destruction with anarchy, unlike chaos. Anarchy is simply the individual choosing rather than having those choices made for them.
h y.htm).
In the real world, there's little difference. Sooner or later, someone will make a choice that relieves you of a choice-- robbery, rape, murder, etc.
Larry Niven wrote an excellent short story on this, called Cloak of Anarchy (http://www.larryniven.org/stories/cloak_of_anarc
One could argue what point Mr. Niven was trying to make, but when I read it, I was well into being an anarchist, and that story started me on the road out.
Says whom?
You have a right to speak, certainly. I'm not so sure about a right to be heard. What does that mean, anyway?
IBM has a patent on Sonny Bono?
Good idea. Maybe that keeps anyone else from making copies.
While it's possible you are correct, it seems also at least as feasible that they were making money from licenses. In that case, they'd have ha dto give up the revenues from the final year or two, or face legal action by licensees. Regarless of the merits of such cases, it probably would have cost more to fight the battles than they made from licenses. Since they were off most peoples' radar screens, they simply chose to keep the status quo. After all, it was making money!
IANAL, NDIPOOTN.
That's because the Soviet Union was alsoa fake. We worked it out with the Russians and related states to keep the Chinese under control.
If only we had realized that Chinese communism was also a fake (perpetrated by the parents of today's Nigerian scammers).
Next up: The EU hoax
Not really! I'm simply quite jealous. That sounds like just about the coolest way to grow up there is. When I was a kid in the 60s, I dreamed of one day growing up to fly in spaceships, walk on other planets, and perhaps die exploring space or defending earth. I used to design spaceships.
When we failed to follow up the Apollo program, when Vietnam and the whole hippie thing with the anti0military-industrial-complex went down, the magic died, and we as a nation lost the vision.
I no longer expect to set foot on another planet, but I am beginning to hope that some day before I die, I can at least get into space and see the beauty there for myself.
Thanks for sharing those vignettes.
By getting the site slashdotted, they assured that the images will live for quite some time on millions of PCs and proxies around the world.
Once the data finally gets through. It feels like they're serving the images off the poor little IBM with core memory that ran the Apollo 11 mission, via a 110 baud acosutic coupler!
What does it mean? It means Microsoft beat Linux. So we're still doomed. DOOMED, I tell you!
Where the heck is BSD???
My kids went to a private school. The school mostly had Macs so old you could see Eve's teeth marks on the apple. A company donated their old PCs running W98, that were at least newer than the (abysmally slow) Apples, and "Voila!" - an all Windows school. (I think the guy who corrdinated the donation helped convert all the data, too.)
I want to bear this judge's baby.
Can someone loan me a uterus?
I'm amazed the judge hasn't had the bailiffs toss SCO into the street, then bury them under their own paperwork. I would have. I'd also have invoked the frivolous lawsuit fines, and started thinking out loud about piercing the corporate veil.
Let's see - evil technology used by evil P2P pirates who want to destroy society vs the federal government, RIAA and MPQA or whatever it is. Who wins?
Duke University - the next "compound in Waco"!
First off, you apparently assume that the only issue is sound reproduction when you speak of distortion not occuring under normal circumstances. And while it happens even there, the huge world of naturally-occuring distortion is guitar amplifiers.
And there are darned few SS amps that even get close to sounding like good tube amps. Distortion is the biggest area, but there are others, as well.
Does everyone like tube amps? No. Does everyone need a tube amp? No. Are they different? Yes. Are they better? That's up to the individual. But a huge number of individuals prefer tube guitar amps for overdriven sounds, even in blind tests.
I grew up on tubes. Like everyone else, I abandoned them in the 60s. Like a lot of other folks, I eventually realized that some of the sounds I wanted simply weren't there with solid state amps. Will they ever be? I have no idea. But they aren't today.
However, I'm highly suspect that Verisign came up with this idea without some self-interest at the heart of it.
Hmmm. Seems like having things reroute better around DDOS attacks *is* in their own self interest.
Also, other have mentioned that competitors already have this. So it's in Verisign's self interest to have it as well, so they don't lose customers (maybe even gain some).
The first point is obviously good for all of us, the second certainly doesn't hurt us.
And this would be worse than the current situation where it takes forever to get IE fixed, and most people don't have a clue what's on their computer.... how?
Either that or the poster's too dumb to trust with a loaded computer. Or a Bill Gates sycophant. Those ar eth eobvious explanations (to me) for someone who'd accuse someone else of not using a browser, but who then cliams to use a browser they obviously didn't attempt to understand.
Yeah, my first thought, too. StorageTek is officially off the list of vendors I'll consider for our backup needs. But hey, it's just a few filers, what do they care?
A few filers here, a few filers there, pretty soon you're talking about their whole market.
Weren't they, at least once in their life, warned about get-rich-quick schemes?
Weren't they, at least once in their life, warned about lying, cheating and stealing???
Ohm yeah, we make our own reality now. Right.
So how come the other guy's reality wins out, hmmm?
I'm sorry - I meant that some folks would take *my* subject as flamebait, not that yours was.
OK, so it's been since the 80s in Atlanta since I've been in a VAX environment (sniff).
But that *was* the typical VAX support guy who showed up. White shirt, dark tie, short hair. You have to remember, their main target was companies who wished they could afford IBM, or who wanted to get away from IBM, or at the very least other, traditional computing environments.
It probably also matters where you are. Today, in Atlanta, I'd still expect the guy to look pretty much the same. If he showed up in Austin looking like that, except *maybe* at a bank, everyone would figure he was a singing telegram joke or a terrorist!