The protection that H264 has is that any outside entity filing an h264 patent lawsuit is going to have to defend themselves against MPEGLA's patent portfolio.
Which means nothing to a patent troll, since they, by definition, produce nothing, and therefore cannot be violating any patents.
Banning sex would make it impossible to effect anyone! (Except through cloning). It would, however, not affect the geeks as much as the rest of the world (unless masturbation were included in the ban).:)
This post brought to you by "Grammer Nazis 4 Gooder Englush".:)
99.999% of all species that ever existed are now extinct
[citation needed]
Indeed, that number seems far too low. I suspect it needs several more nines!
Of course, the exact number is irrelevant to the GPP's point, but since this is slashdot, I assume you knew that and were simply quibbling about an irrelevant detail in the hopes of collecting enough geek-cred points that Natalie Portman would want to pour hot grits in your pants, or something?:)
If any of your friends use Facebook, they can easily tag you in a photo without your ass ever knowing it. If any relatives use Facebook, they can easily mark your birthday as an event. If a boyfriend/girlfriend uses Facebook, they can boast about where you ate dinner.
Yes, why, if it wasn't for Facebook, there'd be no danger of friends or acquaintances revealing things you wish they hadn't.
On a completely unrelated note, I hope my friend Tom Emanekaf wises up and stops cheating on his wife, or he's going to lose her!
"It's an Open Source Book!" Aren't you paying attention?
Yes, an "open source" book made with "open source" tools was a pretty significant event when it first happened, back in the nineteen-eighties! Now it's routine, and free/libre/open-source books (mostly technical manuals, but with a few works of fiction) are common enough that the fact that they're open is not particularly notable, but that wouldn't have happened without the pioneering efforts of the people who first set out to achieve that goal.
There's even a vague analogy between what happened with Blender and what happened when Don Knuth decided he wasn't satisfied with any of the commercial typesetting systems for his textbooks, except that Blender started as a commercial, proprietary system, rather than being written from scratch for the job.
The fact that Free/Libre film-making is starting to reach the point that Free/Libre book-making reached in the '80s is pretty stunning to me. Yes, in a couple of decades, it may seem ho-hum, but that doesn't mean it's not exciting now!
So I can have a file named "polish" and a file named "Polish" side-by-side in the same directory on HFS? Otherwise, it's not a "completely solved problem".
This is what happens when you let a bunch of random self absorbed schmucks think what they are doing is actually important to the world.
Wait, are you referring to the Wikipedia admins or the dickheads who tried to hijack Wikipedia to promote their little in-joke?
From the linked talk page: "No, it shouldn't be an article." -- Randall Munroe
I admit that I already knew what asses the WP admins could be, but this incident has really opened my eyes to what asses the xkcd fans can be. And I say that as someone who joined the Tautology Club the day it was announced.:)
Case can affect meaning: "I helped my Uncle Jack off his horse" vs. "I helped my uncle jack off his horse". It can even affect pronunciation, as in "polish" vs. "Polish". As a user, *I* care about case, though I think that case-insensitive filename completion could be handy at times.
The BBC is a little more skeptical, noting "there are alternative explanations for the bright X-ray source; it could also be a Type IIn supernova, or an ultra-luminous X-ray source (ULX) with an optical counterpart (which could represent several phenomena)."
I might argue that it is an ultra-luminous X-ray source with an optical counterpart that could represent several phenomena, with one of those phenomena being a super-massive black hole being ejected from a galaxy. But hey, that's just me!:)
anything that encourages the self-absorbed political zealots of this country can't possibly be good.
I dunno. Encouraging them to wast their time on Twitter instead of doing things that might have an actual impact on the world sounds like a pretty good idea to me!:)
if Sauerbraten is sausage, you have a much looser definition of sausage than I do.
Of course, like sausage, if you eat enough sauerbraten, you may need to use nukes to unclog your arteries (he said, in a vain attempt to get the thread back on topic).:)
No, the point is that you (or more precisely, the GNOME/KDE devs) have to actively work to bypass the inherent security in Linux, whereas in Windows, the security hole of executable filenames comes for free!:)
You didn't ask which system is more secure given a random mix of unvetted applications. You asked "what is it about the Windows security model that's inferior to the Linux one?" and I answered.
Since I don't use KDE or Gnome on my Linux systems, I would have to say that that sounds more like a flaw in the application--no more a security flaw in Linux than your average PHP exploit is. And I've used XP and saw nothing in there about execute permission bits.
Unless you speak English. If all you can speak is Legalese, then you may have a point, but I don't think I'd want to have a conversation with you in that case!:)
In plain English, Forbidden Planet stole from Shakespeare, even though no laws at all were broken.
MS has a long and proud history of "evil" (in terms of business practices), Apple does not.
I beg to differ. Three words: look-and-feel. Apple is the only company to have ever been the subject of an active boycott by the FSF and League for Programming Freedom. In my book, they were pretty seriously evil back in the day.
To give them credit, they've become a lot less evil over the years, a whole lot faster than MS has (assuming MS has become any less evil, a discussion for another day). But I think they only get partial credit for that--they didn't have a monopoly to leverage, so there was a limit to the levels of evil they could maintain. However, I do think they've gone way beyond the minimum in lowering their evil levels. I also think they've fallen way, way short of the maximum in evil reduction, but I can't say that surprises me as much.:)
Fair enough. (I'm in no position to complain about quibbling when I started it.):)
To further complicate matters, I'll point out that AT&T did sort of put some Unix code in the public domain by the simple expedient of A) writing it before code was copyrightable, and B) not keeping it secret enough to qualify for retroactive copyright protection when the rules changed.
Nevertheless, I'd lay good odds that the original poster had the Caldera Ancient Unix code release in mind when he wrote.
They might be able to sue Novell for 87 gigadollars, but their case against IBM is still dead. IBM acted in good faith, following the license they were given by the valid copyright holder at the time, and it's not IBMs fault if Novell should have turned over the copyrights some time ago. They're blameless. As is everyone else threatened by the SCOsource program.
If you were to say that it's possible SCO's not dead (ignoring, for the sake of a hypothetical, all their other problems), I could probably agree with you. But you started by saying that their case against IBM might now have merit, and I don't believe that's true.
(And yeah, I understand that you're playing devils advocate, and don't have a problem with that. I enjoy the intellectual exercise.)
Actually, they don't give Novell a portion of the fee. They turn over 100% of the fee, and then Novell pays them their agent's percentage.
This may seem like an unimportant legal distinction, but it turns out to be critical in rebutting one of SCO's claims: that they should get the copyrights now, because part of the payments they've made to Novell were (magically, secretly) earmarked to pay for the copyrights. But SCO doesn't pay Novell one penny! They're an agent, they get paid by Novell, not the other way around.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm willing to eat a tasty cupcake to prove your god doesn't exist. It may not be as dramatic as dying, but it is every bit as effective a proof! :)
Unless you're referring to, e.g., this street:
http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=woz+way&sll=37.328331,-121.894298&sspn=0.005955,0.009731&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Woz+Way,+San+Jose,+Santa+Clara,+California&ll=37.326301,-121.892281&spn=0.012337,0.019462&t=h&z=16
The protection that H264 has is that any outside entity filing an h264 patent lawsuit is going to have to defend themselves against MPEGLA's patent portfolio.
Which means nothing to a patent troll, since they, by definition, produce nothing, and therefore cannot be violating any patents.
Banning sex would make it impossible to effect anyone! (Except through cloning). It would, however, not affect the geeks as much as the rest of the world (unless masturbation were included in the ban). :)
This post brought to you by "Grammer Nazis 4 Gooder Englush". :)
[citation needed]
Indeed, that number seems far too low. I suspect it needs several more nines!
Of course, the exact number is irrelevant to the GPP's point, but since this is slashdot, I assume you knew that and were simply quibbling about an irrelevant detail in the hopes of collecting enough geek-cred points that Natalie Portman would want to pour hot grits in your pants, or something? :)
If any of your friends use Facebook, they can easily tag you in a photo without your ass ever knowing it. If any relatives use Facebook, they can easily mark your birthday as an event. If a boyfriend/girlfriend uses Facebook, they can boast about where you ate dinner.
Yes, why, if it wasn't for Facebook, there'd be no danger of friends or acquaintances revealing things you wish they hadn't.
On a completely unrelated note, I hope my friend Tom Emanekaf wises up and stops cheating on his wife, or he's going to lose her!
"It's an Open Source Book!" Aren't you paying attention?
Yes, an "open source" book made with "open source" tools was a pretty significant event when it first happened, back in the nineteen-eighties! Now it's routine, and free/libre/open-source books (mostly technical manuals, but with a few works of fiction) are common enough that the fact that they're open is not particularly notable, but that wouldn't have happened without the pioneering efforts of the people who first set out to achieve that goal.
There's even a vague analogy between what happened with Blender and what happened when Don Knuth decided he wasn't satisfied with any of the commercial typesetting systems for his textbooks, except that Blender started as a commercial, proprietary system, rather than being written from scratch for the job.
The fact that Free/Libre film-making is starting to reach the point that Free/Libre book-making reached in the '80s is pretty stunning to me. Yes, in a couple of decades, it may seem ho-hum, but that doesn't mean it's not exciting now!
So I can have a file named "polish" and a file named "Polish" side-by-side in the same directory on HFS? Otherwise, it's not a "completely solved problem".
This is what happens when you let a bunch of random self absorbed schmucks think what they are doing is actually important to the world.
Wait, are you referring to the Wikipedia admins or the dickheads who tried to hijack Wikipedia to promote their little in-joke?
From the linked talk page: "No, it shouldn't be an article." -- Randall Munroe
I admit that I already knew what asses the WP admins could be, but this incident has really opened my eyes to what asses the xkcd fans can be. And I say that as someone who joined the Tautology Club the day it was announced. :)
Case can affect meaning: "I helped my Uncle Jack off his horse" vs. "I helped my uncle jack off his horse". It can even affect pronunciation, as in "polish" vs. "Polish". As a user, *I* care about case, though I think that case-insensitive filename completion could be handy at times.
The BBC is a little more skeptical, noting "there are alternative explanations for the bright X-ray source; it could also be a Type IIn supernova, or an ultra-luminous X-ray source (ULX) with an optical counterpart (which could represent several phenomena)."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science_and_environment/10108226.stm
I might argue that it is an ultra-luminous X-ray source with an optical counterpart that could represent several phenomena, with one of those phenomena being a super-massive black hole being ejected from a galaxy. But hey, that's just me! :)
anything that encourages the self-absorbed political zealots of this country can't possibly be good.
I dunno. Encouraging them to wast their time on Twitter instead of doing things that might have an actual impact on the world sounds like a pretty good idea to me! :)
Because a lot of the free stuff isnt good.
And this makes it different from the paid, proprietary stuff how?
if Sauerbraten is sausage, you have a much looser definition of sausage than I do.
Of course, like sausage, if you eat enough sauerbraten, you may need to use nukes to unclog your arteries (he said, in a vain attempt to get the thread back on topic). :)
No, the point is that you (or more precisely, the GNOME/KDE devs) have to actively work to bypass the inherent security in Linux, whereas in Windows, the security hole of executable filenames comes for free! :)
You didn't ask which system is more secure given a random mix of unvetted applications. You asked "what is it about the Windows security model that's inferior to the Linux one?" and I answered.
Android has an ssh client--first thing I installed when I got mine. No idea about that other one, since I have zero interest in it.
Since I don't use KDE or Gnome on my Linux systems, I would have to say that that sounds more like a flaw in the application--no more a security flaw in Linux than your average PHP exploit is. And I've used XP and saw nothing in there about execute permission bits.
So what is it about the Windows security model that's inferior to the Linux one?
Well, most notably, the fact that execute permission is implicit in a filename, rather than being a separate attribute that must be manually set.
Ah, but you see, the 20-years-old theory violates the beliefs of many Fox viewers. The world was created by God only last tuesday! :)
Ok, I may be slightly off on that date, but compared to the error factor in the Young Creationists' estimate, I hit it dead on the nose. ;)
Copyright infringement is neither Piracy OR Theft
Unless you speak English. If all you can speak is Legalese, then you may have a point, but I don't think I'd want to have a conversation with you in that case! :)
In plain English, Forbidden Planet stole from Shakespeare, even though no laws at all were broken.
MS has a long and proud history of "evil" (in terms of business practices), Apple does not.
I beg to differ. Three words: look-and-feel. Apple is the only company to have ever been the subject of an active boycott by the FSF and League for Programming Freedom. In my book, they were pretty seriously evil back in the day.
To give them credit, they've become a lot less evil over the years, a whole lot faster than MS has (assuming MS has become any less evil, a discussion for another day). But I think they only get partial credit for that--they didn't have a monopoly to leverage, so there was a limit to the levels of evil they could maintain. However, I do think they've gone way beyond the minimum in lowering their evil levels. I also think they've fallen way, way short of the maximum in evil reduction, but I can't say that surprises me as much. :)
He deliberately disabled password recovery, according to this post by one of the jurors.
Fair enough. (I'm in no position to complain about quibbling when I started it.) :)
To further complicate matters, I'll point out that AT&T did sort of put some Unix code in the public domain by the simple expedient of A) writing it before code was copyrightable, and B) not keeping it secret enough to qualify for retroactive copyright protection when the rules changed.
Nevertheless, I'd lay good odds that the original poster had the Caldera Ancient Unix code release in mind when he wrote.
They might be able to sue Novell for 87 gigadollars, but their case against IBM is still dead. IBM acted in good faith, following the license they were given by the valid copyright holder at the time, and it's not IBMs fault if Novell should have turned over the copyrights some time ago. They're blameless. As is everyone else threatened by the SCOsource program.
If you were to say that it's possible SCO's not dead (ignoring, for the sake of a hypothetical, all their other problems), I could probably agree with you. But you started by saying that their case against IBM might now have merit, and I don't believe that's true.
(And yeah, I understand that you're playing devils advocate, and don't have a problem with that. I enjoy the intellectual exercise.)
provided they give Novell a portion of the fee
Actually, they don't give Novell a portion of the fee. They turn over 100% of the fee, and then Novell pays them their agent's percentage.
This may seem like an unimportant legal distinction, but it turns out to be critical in rebutting one of SCO's claims: that they should get the copyrights now, because part of the payments they've made to Novell were (magically, secretly) earmarked to pay for the copyrights. But SCO doesn't pay Novell one penny! They're an agent, they get paid by Novell, not the other way around.