You know what the whole thing sounds like? Like one of those questions that's written by a parent and given to a kid to ask into a microphone at a school assembly featuring a 'special guest speaker.' I can just hear this being read in the monotone of a little six year old kid.
If they didn't, why the need for Windows NT Service Pack 6a?
Yeah, silly Microsoft. Lord knows that Golden Haired Linux would never need any sort of patch, update, 'service pack,' or bug fixing release because the people who work on linux are special magical humans who don't make mistakes. Unlike the fine folks at Microsoft who are more normal humans, and do make mistakes.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, post ignorant statements to Slashdot.
That's kinda my point; speaking as a parent, I know that you simply can't expect kids to think like that. Hell, you can't expect most adults to act like that. On any given day, I expect to get almost killed at least three times a day simply driving to work; lots of other drives just don't stop to think that by cutting across three lanes without so much as a look or a signal they might actually endanger other people.
The other problem is that everybody is looking for the One True Problem; the one problem that can be fixed, and all will be well. But it's not that simple. It never is.
Humans are social animals, if not pack animals, and will tend to derive self worth from their peer group. And between other kids who mock them, teachers who tell them that 'it's nothing to worry about,' the 'it' in this case being, of course, the child's feelings of unworthyness, and parents who often don't notice such things it can get rather lonely.
Throw in the fact that the average 10-15 year old is probably somewhere in puberty process, depending on race, sex, and a few other factors, and you get some nasty hormonal imbalances influencing the kids towards behaviour that, a year or two later, they'd never dream of.
Oh, and as an aside, zero-tolerance policies are a bad thing; they tend to influence kids into not 'ratting' on friends who are 'talking smack' because they'll get thrown out of school; how do the kids feel when it turns out he wasn't just 'talking smack?' Of course, how do they feel if they do get him kicked out, and it turns out to be nothing?
Yeah. Speaking as a parent, I know that I'd much rather read them stories.
Lets see what we have here...Ahh yes.
Goldilocks; the story of a headstrong young girl practicing the arts of home invasion, theft, vandalism, and stupidity, who then gets away scot free.
Ok, how about Hansel and Gretel, the story of two abused children who are kidnapped and almost eaten?
Ahhh yes, Little Red Riding Hood, who not only is pursued by a wolf, but gets to watch said wolf get vivisected, and then Grandma pops out.
I stopped treating my toddler as a toddler the day that I noticed that she'd manifest a bad habit within a few days of having a story designed to stop said bad habit read to her. Also, they week that she watched Starship Troopers with me without batting an eyelash, but went into full blown hysterics when on a Thanksgiving special of Winnie the Pooh, poor Owl's house blew down in a windstorm.
Almost every poster who's posted to this story (at least the 'top level' comments seems to think that GPL means 'Cannot Charge Money(TM)'.
False.
GPL only ONLY means that you cannot stop whoever gets their hands on it from doing what they like with it, short of removing the GPL. That's it.
I could go download RedHat Linux, and sell it for one million dollars a copy if I really wanted to.
The GPL seems to have been designed to a) keep code free and b) encourage payment by means other than monetary; i.e. by contributing more code, but it certainly does not preclude charging money. How do you think Stallman himself lived for a while?
Anybody who can't understand why these guys want money have obviously never tried running a public site. Geocities doesn't count. Neither does apache on your 1337 Linux box behind a cable modem. Go price a T1 sometime.
Yeah. Thank god that in the commercial UNIX world, you never ever see companies selling licenses that need to be activated.
Why, worse yet, they might even tie licenses to the hostid!
Wait a minute.....
And in Win2k, you can use policies to determine exactly who can shut the machine down when.
A non issue, considering that if it's not locked away in a rack, you can just hit the power switch.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
I can see it now.
*rumble rumble rumble* (deep voice): Wise fwom your gwaavvvvve....(cheezey mario music kicks in) ba da da da da dum! (plink) Doo doo doo doododoodo.....
Jerry Springer does Slashdot
on
NSA Inside?
·
· Score: 2
Sure, the code would be vetted thoroughly before it could ever make it into the kernel, but....
But fucking WHAT you ignorant, sensationalistic, shit stirring fanboy? Oh, no, how dare some large organization follow the entire fucking concept of Linux and contribute useful code! What a god damn shame! And Lord knows that if there's anything Linux really doesn't need, it's more security. These guys should contribute something more useful, like yet another front end to CD Paranoia and LAME, or maybe making a new desktop to compete with KDE and GNOME.
Oh, and of course, being the NSA, they'll have NO PROBLEM slipping secret code into their source that nobody will ever be able to pick out. People will have to change their monikers from 'I only install from source; it's the only way to be safe' to, well....I guess that you'll just have to write everything you install yourself. Good luck writing that compiler in ASM, boyo.
Slashdot has officially and irrevocably become the Fox Network of Linux. "Did we really land on the Moon?" "Is the NSA conducting a shadowy takeover of Linux?"
Slashdot Mirror
Never make the mistake of confusing sticker price with total cost.
You know what the whole thing sounds like? Like one of those questions that's written by a parent and given to a kid to ask into a microphone at a school assembly featuring a 'special guest speaker.' I can just hear this being read in the monotone of a little six year old kid.
Well, out of every 100 men they asked, 75 said they didn't enjoy online porn. Ergo, 75% of men are liars. :-)
Slashdottie: SOFTWARE WANTS TO BE FREE! Microsoftie: Oh, ok. Here's IE for free. Slashdottie: HOW DARE YOU RUN NETSCAPE OUT OF BUSINESS?!
You don't 'control the wire' unless they're both fully tempest shielded and contained in an airtight pipe pressurized with inert gas.
Search your hard drive for 'dvdplay.exe' which both 98 and 2000 ship with. Not to mention Windows Media Player.
That gives you a single point of failure, unfortunately.
Lots of schools are implementing a 'words equal actions' sort of policy, I'm afraid.
That's kinda my point; speaking as a parent, I know that you simply can't expect kids to think like that. Hell, you can't expect most adults to act like that. On any given day, I expect to get almost killed at least three times a day simply driving to work; lots of other drives just don't stop to think that by cutting across three lanes without so much as a look or a signal they might actually endanger other people. The other problem is that everybody is looking for the One True Problem; the one problem that can be fixed, and all will be well. But it's not that simple. It never is.
Humans are social animals, if not pack animals, and will tend to derive self worth from their peer group. And between other kids who mock them, teachers who tell them that 'it's nothing to worry about,' the 'it' in this case being, of course, the child's feelings of unworthyness, and parents who often don't notice such things it can get rather lonely. Throw in the fact that the average 10-15 year old is probably somewhere in puberty process, depending on race, sex, and a few other factors, and you get some nasty hormonal imbalances influencing the kids towards behaviour that, a year or two later, they'd never dream of. Oh, and as an aside, zero-tolerance policies are a bad thing; they tend to influence kids into not 'ratting' on friends who are 'talking smack' because they'll get thrown out of school; how do the kids feel when it turns out he wasn't just 'talking smack?' Of course, how do they feel if they do get him kicked out, and it turns out to be nothing?
Yeah. Speaking as a parent, I know that I'd much rather read them stories. Lets see what we have here...Ahh yes. Goldilocks; the story of a headstrong young girl practicing the arts of home invasion, theft, vandalism, and stupidity, who then gets away scot free. Ok, how about Hansel and Gretel, the story of two abused children who are kidnapped and almost eaten? Ahhh yes, Little Red Riding Hood, who not only is pursued by a wolf, but gets to watch said wolf get vivisected, and then Grandma pops out. I stopped treating my toddler as a toddler the day that I noticed that she'd manifest a bad habit within a few days of having a story designed to stop said bad habit read to her. Also, they week that she watched Starship Troopers with me without batting an eyelash, but went into full blown hysterics when on a Thanksgiving special of Winnie the Pooh, poor Owl's house blew down in a windstorm.
Can't speak to the serial ports, but my Toshiba Satellite Pro 4200 has TV out.
Nah. After the code merge with the Windows Millenium Edition code, it'll be called..... Windows: Y/ME *ducks and runs*
Almost every poster who's posted to this story (at least the 'top level' comments seems to think that GPL means 'Cannot Charge Money(TM)'. False. GPL only ONLY means that you cannot stop whoever gets their hands on it from doing what they like with it, short of removing the GPL. That's it. I could go download RedHat Linux, and sell it for one million dollars a copy if I really wanted to. The GPL seems to have been designed to a) keep code free and b) encourage payment by means other than monetary; i.e. by contributing more code, but it certainly does not preclude charging money. How do you think Stallman himself lived for a while? Anybody who can't understand why these guys want money have obviously never tried running a public site. Geocities doesn't count. Neither does apache on your 1337 Linux box behind a cable modem. Go price a T1 sometime.
I prefered Jyhad. With no expansions.
And in Win2k, you can use policies to determine exactly who can shut the machine down when. A non issue, considering that if it's not locked away in a rack, you can just hit the power switch.
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I can see it now. *rumble rumble rumble* (deep voice): Wise fwom your gwaavvvvve....(cheezey mario music kicks in) ba da da da da dum! (plink) Doo doo doo doododoodo.....
What, like the Audis that used to have the sudden unwanted acceleration problem?