In the Industrial revolution, mechanical engineers were in high demand, then they foolishly designed and built production lines that would automate and therefore remove their own jobs, they dug their own grave, placed themselves in a coffin, lowered themselves, and dynamited the grave shut. Are we doing the same?
No. In fact, I am concerned that the GPL advocates are doing the opposite!
When asked where the money will come from, many claim that they will develop software as a "service" that is "individualized to the customer". One of their allies, Larry Lessig, coined the phrase "code is law".
Where does this lead? I'll tell you where it leads: programmers become like lawyers. Linux, supposedly written by developers for developers, is much harder to use than Windows. Installing and maintaining Linux is like trying to understand tax forms some times.
Deprived of licensing revenues, developers will be drawn towards writing complex, difficult to maintain code; code that will require constant attention; code that won't be useful without a consultant. Programmers will design programs to maximize "billable hours". Coders, once the hi-tech heroes, will become just as reviled as lawyers.
Say good-bye to applications that can simply be installed. Everything will have to be "compiled to match the parameters of your network environment" and the lawyer... err... umm... consultant, will visit you and charge $200/hr to "perform the standard system integration procedures for version 5.63.2 patchlevel 5 as recommended by circular 12-422 from the Bureau of Information Technology". it will usually take 5 hours, not including phone consultations.
Hmm.. the definition I typically hold for 'greed' is "the excessive desire to acquire or possess more than one needs or deserves." (WordNet) But of course that's relative to an extent. The reason I would say most proprietary software tends to promote greed is that more than often, the folks that own proprietary software companies are not just looking to do a good job and live comfortably--they're in it to get rich and be the next Big Thing.
Getting rich and becomeing the next Big Thing is not the same as being greedy. The dictionary definition of greed contains two words: need and deserve. Now, you might question whether or not the CEO of Oracle needs a yacht, jet and limo, but what give you the right to determine somebody else's needs? If you start doing that, you go down the slippery slope towards a command economy. Determining what someone deserves is equally troubling. In either case, you have to presume that you know what's right for another person. At the very least, this makes you no better than them. At the very worst, it make you totalitarian. At the core of communist ideology, we find "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" and we know what a morass they got into determining what other people needed. The people who made such decisions ended up living much better than everybody else. In other words... let he who is without greed cast the first stone.
And many times, those people are not the ones even writing the code. It's often a similar situation to the music industry--you have these middle-men between the artists and consumers that are getting the biggest piece of the pie.
There is a very easy solution to that problem. Leave and start your own company (some great companies were formed like this). If you can't do that, it means that you actually need the people you work for. The "suits" perform a vital function--they assume the risk that you can't. Most people are better off taking the 50k/yr because the work they do can't be sold directly to consumers. Well you say, then perhaps you and some of your cube mates could sell directly to consumers. Great. Pitch that idea to your cube-mates, scrape some money together, rent your own office... oh... see what happens? You end up becoming a suit yourself. It's the worst system in the world except for all the others.
With proprietary software, you also have a lot of wheel-reinventing which is not at all beneficial to the economy.
There is very little in any software that is as simple as a wheel. Even something disarminly simply such as a stack can be implemented a lot of different ways. This diversity is good for the consumer, and good for the economy. (sidenote, your argument and mine only apply to competitive markets. Monopolies are a separate issue).
There is no inherent moral / human right to claim information as property as you would a physical object.
Well, this really is a core value conflict. I'm not sure how we can resolve it. I just know that when somebody asserts that they have a right to take my work, I find that repugnant. Ironicly, you can use that same reaction to bolster your own, opposite core belief. True, congress did not acknowledge it as a right, but they also failed to acknowledge the rights of Negroes. I believe we have evolved towards a society where some control over one's IP is a fundamental right, just as we evolved towards a society where control of one's time is a fundamental right.
The modern state of copyright does in fact prevent anything useful from reaching the public domain--especially with terms being extended every time Mickey Mouse is about to go PD
I actually agree with this. This has less to do with IP, and more with the larger issue of the relationship between corporations and the government, which is currently being contested in the mainstream non-geek political world. If we can resolve the issue of corporate power, the Mickey problem will be resolved along with it.
Will software written today have any value 95+ years from now? No. Absolutely none.
It may have some, (consider how old Unix is now) but I agree that the schedule for contributing software to the PD (*not* GPL) should probably be shorter.
That bit about "taxing" is plainly ridiculous because it implies true ownership. "Intellectual property" is a priveledge, NOT a right. On the other hand, the ownership of physical property IS a basic right in all free societies.
Once again we have a core value conflict. However, the last part of your argument plays in my favor. You assert that PP is a basic right. Yet PP is taxed. Therefore, you must agree that formulating IP as a fundamental right does not imply perpetual or total control over one's IP. OTOH, a failure to recognize IP as a right could lead to total control over my IP by those who believe that such actions are in the public interest. That's part of the reason why I argue that IP should be formulated as regular P for tax purposes. It might also simplify the tax code and provide a more convenient means of adjusting the balance between private and public interests. A simple argument about the IP tax rate might be much easier to handle than the ad-hoc politics swirling around the issue these days.
I would like to say more, but time is running short and this article may be archived soon. If you like, we could continue this in a Slashdot journal. I don't have one yet, but it's probably no big deal to start one.
That's probably a bit of a stretch, but in a way you can see his reasoning: greed is immoral, most proprietary software promotes greed, therefore most proprietary software is immoral
I agree that greed is immoral, but I disagree that proprietary software promotes greed. Given that, following the chain of your logic any further is pointless.
I believe that the only rational way to deal with intellectual property is to treat it in much the same way we treat physical property. Many policy makers seem to have reached the same conclusion. Now, some people in the Free Software movement have concluded that treating IP as normal P would result in nothing ever reaching the public domain. This is demonstrably false, since my regular P is routinely taxed. The expiration of copyright, and the limited scope of copyright is the equivalent of a tax on IP. So, the existance of proprietary software is nothing more than a practical social contract designed to strike a balance between users and creators. It doesn't "promote greed" any more than money promotes greed. Now, if you are one of those people who says that money promotes greed, then I suggest you try living in a barter economy. The practical importance, yea, even the *good* of money will become readily apparent.
As for whether or not the GPL is capitalist, it depends on who is using it and why. The GPL after all is just a license. It has no soul. Therefore, it can have no motive. Now, I have used and even contributed to GPL'd projects because they were the only ones that met my need. I am not so much of an idealogue that I would shoot myself in the foot. My motives were plainly capitalist in that I surveyed the market and made a free choice that best fit my needs. OTOH, when I see people gloating over how they are going to make MSFT irrelevant, how "all software should be free", how governments should be required to use it, plainly there is an anti-capitalist zeal associated with this. There is plainly a "vision" held by many people in the Free Software movement, and the GPL is their tool to implement that vision, and that vision is decidedly *not* capitalist.
While it is true that there is not currently a government body forcing you to choose GPL, the achievement of a monopoly by a GPL'd piece of software would effectively force you to work under the GPL. Linux may become the first test case for this. The harm to consumers could be incalculable, as development of alternatives could be stifled for decades. More likely, a "private OS" will remain available, but only the wealthy will be able to afford it.
It is also possible that the proprietary software could be outlawed and that is why RMS's accusation that it's immoral is such a sore spot. Why? Because all law has a moral foundation. By casting proprietary software as "immoral", RMS lays the foundation for legal action. You have to understand, I'm not talking about something that will affect you or me. I'm talking about things that will play out over 100 years or more. The time from initial philosophical tracts to oppression is lenghty. IIRC, Marx and Engles were dead before any "communist" states arose. The Free Software movement is but a baby. We will probably be dead by the time copylefted software starts to cause social problems. I am writing these things in the hopes that our great grand children might dig these words out of an archive some day, and that true liberators of the future will be able to point back to a prophet who foresaw their fate, who will encourage them to fight for what is right. My far greater hope is that they will never need it.
Huh? GPL advocates argue that the GPL doesn't "erode intellecutal property" or whatever it was that the guy from MSFT says. Yet, at the same time they argue that if you look at MSFT code you will turn into stone, like it was medusa or something. The two viewpoints are not consistant. If you have been using MSFT's code and want to "get out" of the license, simply stop linking their libraries. Now, if you make extensive mods to a library and/or comingle library code with your app you are too stupid to be in the business anyway.
"Contamination" is a big myth in the software world. If you want to get out of any licence, GPL or otherwise, simply stop linking the code. The accuser has no basis to come after you simply because you *used to* use their code. I am not aware of any cases where somebody linked a library, found an alternative, and then get sued by the owner of the former library. Can you cite any such case? Who's spreading FUD now?
No, trying to 'defeat the GPL' would create a hideous mess that would severely hinder the OSS movement. I'm sorry, but you have no idea what you're talking about
Let me quote RMS: "I make the assumption in this paper that a user of software is no less important than an author, or even an author's employer. In other words, their interests and needs have equal weight, when we decide which course of action is best." (http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/shouldbefree.html)
Those of us who oppose RMS don't disagree with his premise--only the conclusion that he draws from it. He was led to conclude that IP rights are unimportant, and to not care about entrepreneurs. Just as RMS doesn't care about the fate of the entreprenurial spirit, I don't care about the OSS movement. It can stay or it can go. I really don't care. It's not important. Fundamental rights are more important.
People who write software and release it under GPL do so because they want their code to remain free under all circumstances--and it is their right to insist upon that.
Fine. I have no desire to take that right away. It's RMS who preaches that proprietary software is immoral. I never said that copylefting is immoral. If you want to copyleft your software, fine. If you want to shave your head and join the Hare Krishnas, fine. If you want want to preach Islam, fine.
If you want to use my tax dollars to fund copyleft, not fine. If you indoctrinate my child and steal all her money, not fine. If you preach hatred from the Mosque, not fine. I will preach against you. That is my right. That is why America is a great country--not because people are compelled to think one "good" way, but because we are allowed to think any way we want. America is about the freedom to worship in any manner. In a sense, that freedom is the precursor to the "freedom to release under any license" as O'Reilly said. As long as we can agree to maintain that freedom, I have no quarrel with the Free Software movement. Unfortunately there are many in the movement who do not respect that freedom.
The argument that (misguided) BSD/anti-GPL fanatics make is that GPL is "less free" because you're not allowed to take my code, modify it, and sell it as proprietary software. The illogical conclusion then follows that GPL is about making it impossible to make money writing software. WRONG! GPL is about making it impossible to make money *selling* proprietary licenses for copies of the software. There's nothing preventing anyone from selling their labor as the cost of writing GPL'ed code ie.) making money by contracted development.
The production of cocaine, the marketing of crack, and the enforcement of drug laws really aren't about turning inner cities into war zones either, but that's what happens. However, people who make this argument are correct in one sense. The GPL is not strictly about making software an unprofitable business. It's about socializing software development.
Eliminating all proprietary software (whether 5 years or 50 years from now) is a very worthy goal. It's as simple as that
I'm not usually one to nitpick over grammar, but I have to admit this bothers me too. The verb "to power" is evolving towards "to be a major integral part of". The first time I noticed this was "powered by Apache". IIRC, I went off on this, perhaps even on/.. "It's powered by electricity doofus, and that's powered mostly by coal in much of Virginia, and coal is mined by sweaty guys from West Virginia, so I'm going to put 'powered by sweaty guys from West Virginia' on my website".
So, what would be a concise alternative to "powered" in these situations? perhaps "iamipo" for Is A Major Integral Part Of. Slashdot. Iamipoed by Apache. Apache Iamipoes Slashdot. I iamipo, he iamipoes, you iamipo (yes I realize "to be" is irregular, but there is no good reason to introduce another irregular verb. If anything, the Ebonic use of "to be" should become the sanctioned usage to make English more learnable for the rest of the world). How's that?
Absolutely. For that matter, nobody held a gun to your head and made you drive. They do, however, hold a gun to your head if you don't pay your taxes and it was the oil-auto axis that corrupted the government into subsidizing roads more than rails. So, how do you break up the oil-auto-government monopoly? AFAIK, you can stage a tax revolt based on the percentage of your money being used to fund roads, but there isn't a strong enough groundswell yet to pull that off. Also, the damage has been done. We already live in suburbs with no rail service.
Just think. If Standard Oil had remained a monopoly, they might have charged confiscatory prices, and people might not have been so eager to move to Levitown. Cities might not have lost their tax base and declined into urban blight. The air might be a lot cleaner.
The last thing we need is for the government to "solve" the IT problems the way it "solved" the energy industry problems.
Well I am a US citizen, and I do have a right to complain--that they went after MS in the first place. Tell me, when are they going to go after Apple for their "monopoly on Motorola based PCs" which surely must be as bad as a "monopoly on Intel PCs". At least MSFT will sell you Windows for a price, and you can run virtual PC on a Mac. Apple won't sell you any version of their OS for x86. They just want to protect their Motorolla monopoly. I demand choice from Apple! I want my OS-X for x86 yesterday!!!
I'm serious; judge Jackson was way off the mark. Essentially, he narrowed the definition of "PC" to "x86 box". That was the only way there could be a "monopoly".
Essentially, what MSFT is trying to do is attach a little bit of self-replecating "DNA" to their IP. Whenever a cell is innoculated with MSFT's code, it becomes immune to the GPL virus.
So, if I have a BSD project and I link it to MSFT's code, its genetic makeup is slightly altered--it is now a mutant cell that produces the enzyme Microsoftase which breaks down radical Leftist subcultures... OK, at this point the analogy breaks down, but I think you get the idea.
Let me state with no equivocation that I LIKE THIS. The GPL-lovers with their twisted notion of freedom can whine all they want about this not being fair competition, but it is. I had been looking for ways to defeat the GPL without making it illegal (there is nothing that says you have to use MS file sharing systems, you can still use your own GPL'd file sharing system). This is the best idea I've seen yet. Now, it would be cool if some other people would release legal virii on the Open Source world--it could break the near monopoly that GPL has on OSS licenses.
That said, I don't like SW patents and hope that they don't rely too much on that technique. The GPL has threatened to use patents too (and has done so for the Mersenne Twister algorithm) IMHO, patents are the nuclear weapons in the GPL vs. Proprietary war. Let's both keep our fingers off the button. OK?
As every good Slashdrone knows, MSFT is the only entity that can steal intellectual "property". For everybody else, there is no such thing as intellectual property, and it's called "sharing". Thank you for reminding u--oh! That's the muezzin. Time to bow towards Cambridge and pray.
Of course it isn't complete though. The other day I started to vacuum the basement. The cleaner wasn't picking up much, so I examined the underside. The roller had a lot of threads and hair and stuff stuck to it. So I started to clean it. While I was cleaning it, the belt came off right in my hand. It had snapped, which explained why it wasn't working very well. I had never serviced a vacuum cleaner before. I examined the plastic cover, and much to my delight it was designed to snap off with the aid of a flat-bladed screwdriver. There were even handly little pictograms cast into the plastic that showed you where to pry. Once I had the motor shaft exposed, I knew I could replace the belt--if only I could find the right part. Here's the good part. I went to Fischer's Hardware. Not only is DIY and the mom-n-pop hardware store not dead, the mom-n-pop hardware store with no web presence of its own and nothing more than a listing with the chamber of commerce is not dead either. Fischer's has been in Springfield as long as I can remember, and I can remember a lot longer than I care to say. But wait, it gets better. Fischer's staff, unlike the huge box store staff, is always helpful. So I was not the least bit reluctant to walk in there with a broken belt and get either a replacement or a referral to someone who had a replacement (they referred for the fan motor for our bathroom). The guy in the vacuum department didn't have an official Hoover parts guide. When I said "do you need the model number" he gave me this look and said "don't get me started on model numbers". He took out some similar sized belts and started comparing them. When he found a close match, he handed me a Eureka belt and said "You can try this, and if it doesn't work use the yellow pages, get the part number from the mfct..." In other words, what I was too lazy to do in the first place and went to Fischer's to avoid doing. You can't get real-world expertise, honesty, and common sense like that from Home Depot. The belt was $2.18 and well... I had a coupon for $2.00. This was a no-brainer. Not having to track down a "genuine hoover part" was worth an $0.18 gamble. So I bought the little belt, got it home, and installed it. It was a little wider than the original belt, but it fit. The cleaner works fine now. I ran it for a good 15 minutes and there was no smoke or anything. Hopefully this fix will last, and even if it only lasts a few months I will happily buy another belt from the vacuum-cleaner hacker at Fischer's. That might cost more in the short run, but if Fischer's ever went away it would be a priceless loss.
If the primary product of combustion is CO2, you are OK becasue CO2 is a natural part of the carbon cycle--trees and phytoplankton turn it back into O2. So, as long as there are enough photosynthesizing organisms to complete the cycle, you can release all the CO2 you want.
I agree with the OP that H2 is another matter. Release twice the number of H atoms as there are O atoms, it all becomes water, and the only way to get the O2 back is by electrolysis or some other man-made process. As far as I know, there are no eletrolytic organisms or other natural process to get the O2 back, so we are screwed.
Of course there must be some natural process that liberates O2, otherwise the whole carbon cycle wouldn't have gotten set up in the first place. However, that O2 was probably liberated over a long period.
If we go to a H2 based fuel economy, perhaps we will need to have some kind of accounting for oxygen production. In other words, no license to produce H2 fuel unless you also release O2. This would be no problem for traditional H2 producers which (as far as I know) are using electrolysis and presumably putting O2 back into the system. It would only be a problem for "fossil H2" producers, who would have to find an O2 source.
Are you sure you don't mean Spider-Person? Or perhaps Spider-American or Arachno-American. Then of course there are those who believe it should be GNU/Spider.
Do you have a link for that? I'll have to listen very closely the next time I&S comes on. Maybe I should submit this to kissthisguy.com. Now, I wonder if I can fit the corrected version in the 120 character limit...
Amen. Geeks suck. I'm sick and tired of hearing about "geeks" who are great people because they can do drugs and get laid like all the other idiots on campus. I'd much rather be a sober nerd who can integrate the equations in the back of the book, and who gets married to the first woman he lays.
Windows 2000/XP/ME only. Win98 users need not apply.... onboard sound...
OK, forget about this board. It smells of planned obsolescence. The extra IDE slots are the bait. Almost everything else is a hook. What if I want to install DOS on this board. OK, probably not, but just knowing that I can is nice. Wintel boxes are nice because they are backwards compatable and give you a choice of what cards to use. If I wanted onboard everything and was never going to swap out or uprade, I'd get an iMac. Then of course there is the question that every/.er *must* ask: Did MS have a hand in making this not work with earlier versions of Windows?
I have been meaning to post parody signs, but I'm too lazy to do it. I was going to post: "Lose 30 dollars in 30 days, gauranteed. Call 1-800-FAT-SCAM". Would somebody please do this for me?
An "evil, aggressive, monopoly" can't sell stuff to people who don't want it. Will wonders never cease? Nevertheless, I think we need a few more years of litigation followed by government regulation to stop Hailstorm anyway. You know... just in case.
(close captioning for the sarcasm impaired: THAT WAS SARCASM. Thank-you.)
I wouldn't have any problem with teachers teaching about condoms if they also taught about the condom failure rate for which many reports are available. To drive the point home, perhaps the teachers could also have the students play a game. They could spin a wheel each day of class. If the wheel landed on the safe zone, they would get a free piece of candy. If it landed on the danger zone they would have to pay for all the candy they had eaten. At the 100 to 1 odds cited in the linked study, I wonder how many students would play the game.
Poltics is the art of compromise. Do you think it's a lost art? It's the art that's in the Constitution with regards to IP, and it's an art that can be redisovered. Maybe teachers are too busy teaching kids how to put on condoms to rediscover the Constitution. Why do you believe the outcome is going to be one-sided? Why do the RIAA or the AIP movement have to "win". If either side wins, everybody loses. It's just a different kind of loss.
I'm not so sure if we need a political solution anyway. If the RIAA really needs money to do things, and if they really can't stop people from stealing their music, then they will eventually run out of money and logicly, no longer be able to do things. If, in the mean time, they start punishing people who haven't done anything wrong, this will only accelerate the process. Why? Because I know that I, if punished for having done no crime, will be converted to the pirate camp. I suspect others will jump ship too, thus accelerating the process. If I have to deal with clunky built-in copy protection that makes it hard to work, that might easily be enough to push me over the line. It just depends on how much they are punishing me for having DONE NOTHING WRONG. It's only fair--if I have to do the time, I might as well do the crime.
OTOH, if someone can come up with a successful business model that's an alternative to what the RIAA offers, that will work too. Or, maybe the RIAA will actually do some kind of customer survey and discover that they really are losing customers because they are being dicks. That would tend to create non-extreme reform also.
That's why I hate DRM and Copyleft. They are both examples of extremism. If the Communists and the Fascists want to fight, why don't they just crater Europe again. Isn't that what it's there for?:)
The rich get richer by buying property and then renting it or selling it for much more than it originally cost them. Inventing new kinds of property (like copyrighted software, for instance) just gives them more opportunities.
Only half true. First, "the rich" is a misnomer. I was talking about the power elites. Driving a Mercedes does not make you a power elite. Owning half of Mercedes-Benz dramaticly increases the odds that you are a member of the power elite, though even that level of wealth is no gaurantee. BG does not present as a classic member of the power elite. The other half-truth here is that new revenue streams provide new opportunities for the power elites. The trouble is, they also provide opportunities for nouveau-riche guys like BG and the PEs hate that. So, the PEs are willing to do things like increase taxes or stifle IP if they believe it won't hurt them too much, all the while knowing that it will prevent new contenders from rising. That's whey the AIP movement is favored by the PEs.
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In the Industrial revolution, mechanical engineers were in high demand, then they foolishly designed and built production lines that would automate and therefore remove their own jobs, they dug their own grave, placed themselves in a coffin, lowered themselves, and dynamited the grave shut. Are we doing the same?
No. In fact, I am concerned that the GPL advocates are doing the opposite!
When asked where the money will come from, many claim that they will develop software as a "service" that is "individualized to the customer". One of their allies, Larry Lessig, coined the phrase "code is law".
Where does this lead? I'll tell you where it leads: programmers become like lawyers. Linux, supposedly written by developers for developers, is much harder to use than Windows. Installing and maintaining Linux is like trying to understand tax forms some times.
Deprived of licensing revenues, developers will be drawn towards writing complex, difficult to maintain code; code that will require constant attention; code that won't be useful without a consultant. Programmers will design programs to maximize "billable hours". Coders, once the hi-tech heroes, will become just as reviled as lawyers.
Say good-bye to applications that can simply be installed. Everything will have to be "compiled to match the parameters of your network environment" and the lawyer... err... umm... consultant, will visit you and charge $200/hr to "perform the standard system integration procedures for version 5.63.2 patchlevel 5 as recommended by circular 12-422 from the Bureau of Information Technology". it will usually take 5 hours, not including phone consultations.
See my journal.
Part 2 of my response to this is in my journal
Hmm.. the definition I typically hold for 'greed' is "the excessive desire to acquire or possess more than one needs or deserves." (WordNet) But of course that's relative to an extent. The reason I would say most proprietary software tends to promote greed is that more than often, the folks that own proprietary software companies are not just looking to do a good job and live comfortably--they're in it to get rich and be the next Big Thing.
Getting rich and becomeing the next Big Thing is not the same as being greedy. The dictionary definition of greed contains two words: need and deserve. Now, you might question whether or not the CEO of Oracle needs a yacht, jet and limo, but what give you the right to determine somebody else's needs? If you start doing that, you go down the slippery slope towards a command economy. Determining what someone deserves is equally troubling. In either case, you have to presume that you know what's right for another person. At the very least, this makes you no better than them. At the very worst, it make you totalitarian. At the core of communist ideology, we find "from each according to his ability, to each according to his need" and we know what a morass they got into determining what other people needed. The people who made such decisions ended up living much better than everybody else. In other words... let he who is without greed cast the first stone.
And many times, those people are not the ones even writing the code. It's often a similar situation to the music industry--you have these middle-men between the artists and consumers that are getting the biggest piece of the pie.
There is a very easy solution to that problem. Leave and start your own company (some great companies were formed like this). If you can't do that, it means that you actually need the people you work for. The "suits" perform a vital function--they assume the risk that you can't. Most people are better off taking the 50k/yr because the work they do can't be sold directly to consumers. Well you say, then perhaps you and some of your cube mates could sell directly to consumers. Great. Pitch that idea to your cube-mates, scrape some money together, rent your own office... oh... see what happens? You end up becoming a suit yourself. It's the worst system in the world except for all the others.
With proprietary software, you also have a lot of wheel-reinventing which is not at all beneficial to the economy.
There is very little in any software that is as simple as a wheel. Even something disarminly simply such as a stack can be implemented a lot of different ways. This diversity is good for the consumer, and good for the economy. (sidenote, your argument and mine only apply to competitive markets. Monopolies are a separate issue).
There is no inherent moral / human right to claim information as property as you would a physical object.
Well, this really is a core value conflict. I'm not sure how we can resolve it. I just know that when somebody asserts that they have a right to take my work, I find that repugnant. Ironicly, you can use that same reaction to bolster your own, opposite core belief. True, congress did not acknowledge it as a right, but they also failed to acknowledge the rights of Negroes. I believe we have evolved towards a society where some control over one's IP is a fundamental right, just as we evolved towards a society where control of one's time is a fundamental right.
The modern state of copyright does in fact prevent anything useful from reaching the public domain--especially with terms being extended every time Mickey Mouse is about to go PD
I actually agree with this. This has less to do with IP, and more with the larger issue of the relationship between corporations and the government, which is currently being contested in the mainstream non-geek political world. If we can resolve the issue of corporate power, the Mickey problem will be resolved along with it.
Will software written today have any value 95+ years from now? No. Absolutely none.
It may have some, (consider how old Unix is now) but I agree that the schedule for contributing software to the PD (*not* GPL) should probably be shorter.
That bit about "taxing" is plainly ridiculous because it implies true ownership. "Intellectual property" is a priveledge, NOT a right. On the other hand, the ownership of physical property IS a basic right in all free societies.
Once again we have a core value conflict. However, the last part of your argument plays in my favor. You assert that PP is a basic right. Yet PP is taxed. Therefore, you must agree that formulating IP as a fundamental right does not imply perpetual or total control over one's IP. OTOH, a failure to recognize IP as a right could lead to total control over my IP by those who believe that such actions are in the public interest. That's part of the reason why I argue that IP should be formulated as regular P for tax purposes. It might also simplify the tax code and provide a more convenient means of adjusting the balance between private and public interests. A simple argument about the IP tax rate might be much easier to handle than the ad-hoc politics swirling around the issue these days.
I would like to say more, but time is running short and this article may be archived soon. If you like, we could continue this in a Slashdot journal. I don't have one yet, but it's probably no big deal to start one.
That's probably a bit of a stretch, but in a way you can see his reasoning: greed is immoral, most proprietary software promotes greed, therefore most proprietary software is immoral
I agree that greed is immoral, but I disagree that proprietary software promotes greed. Given that, following the chain of your logic any further is pointless.
I believe that the only rational way to deal with intellectual property is to treat it in much the same way we treat physical property. Many policy makers seem to have reached the same conclusion. Now, some people in the Free Software movement have concluded that treating IP as normal P would result in nothing ever reaching the public domain. This is demonstrably false, since my regular P is routinely taxed. The expiration of copyright, and the limited scope of copyright is the equivalent of a tax on IP. So, the existance of proprietary software is nothing more than a practical social contract designed to strike a balance between users and creators. It doesn't "promote greed" any more than money promotes greed. Now, if you are one of those people who says that money promotes greed, then I suggest you try living in a barter economy. The practical importance, yea, even the *good* of money will become readily apparent.
As for whether or not the GPL is capitalist, it depends on who is using it and why. The GPL after all is just a license. It has no soul. Therefore, it can have no motive. Now, I have used and even contributed to GPL'd projects because they were the only ones that met my need. I am not so much of an idealogue that I would shoot myself in the foot. My motives were plainly capitalist in that I surveyed the market and made a free choice that best fit my needs. OTOH, when I see people gloating over how they are going to make MSFT irrelevant, how "all software should be free", how governments should be required to use it, plainly there is an anti-capitalist zeal associated with this. There is plainly a "vision" held by many people in the Free Software movement, and the GPL is their tool to implement that vision, and that vision is decidedly *not* capitalist.
While it is true that there is not currently a government body forcing you to choose GPL, the achievement of a monopoly by a GPL'd piece of software would effectively force you to work under the GPL. Linux may become the first test case for this. The harm to consumers could be incalculable, as development of alternatives could be stifled for decades. More likely, a "private OS" will remain available, but only the wealthy will be able to afford it.
It is also possible that the proprietary software could be outlawed and that is why RMS's accusation that it's immoral is such a sore spot. Why? Because all law has a moral foundation. By casting proprietary software as "immoral", RMS lays the foundation for legal action. You have to understand, I'm not talking about something that will affect you or me. I'm talking about things that will play out over 100 years or more. The time from initial philosophical tracts to oppression is lenghty. IIRC, Marx and Engles were dead before any "communist" states arose. The Free Software movement is but a baby. We will probably be dead by the time copylefted software starts to cause social problems. I am writing these things in the hopes that our great grand children might dig these words out of an archive some day, and that true liberators of the future will be able to point back to a prophet who foresaw their fate, who will encourage them to fight for what is right. My far greater hope is that they will never need it.
Huh? GPL advocates argue that the GPL doesn't "erode intellecutal property" or whatever it was that the guy from MSFT says. Yet, at the same time they argue that if you look at MSFT code you will turn into stone, like it was medusa or something. The two viewpoints are not consistant. If you have been using MSFT's code and want to "get out" of the license, simply stop linking their libraries. Now, if you make extensive mods to a library and/or comingle library code with your app you are too stupid to be in the business anyway.
"Contamination" is a big myth in the software world. If you want to get out of any licence, GPL or otherwise, simply stop linking the code. The accuser has no basis to come after you simply because you *used to* use their code. I am not aware of any cases where somebody linked a library, found an alternative, and then get sued by the owner of the former library. Can you cite any such case? Who's spreading FUD now?
No, trying to 'defeat the GPL' would create a hideous mess that would severely hinder the OSS movement. I'm sorry, but you have no idea what you're talking about
Let me quote RMS: "I make the assumption in this paper that a user of software is no less important than an author, or even an author's employer. In other words, their interests and needs have equal weight, when we decide which course of action is best." (http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/shouldbefree.html)
Those of us who oppose RMS don't disagree with his premise--only the conclusion that he draws from it. He was led to conclude that IP rights are unimportant, and to not care about entrepreneurs. Just as RMS doesn't care about the fate of the entreprenurial spirit, I don't care about the OSS movement. It can stay or it can go. I really don't care. It's not important. Fundamental rights are more important.
People who write software and release it under GPL do so because they want their code to remain free under all circumstances--and it is their right to insist upon that.
Fine. I have no desire to take that right away. It's RMS who preaches that proprietary software is immoral. I never said that copylefting is immoral. If you want to copyleft your software, fine. If you want to shave your head and join the Hare Krishnas, fine. If you want want to preach Islam, fine.
If you want to use my tax dollars to fund copyleft, not fine. If you indoctrinate my child and steal all her money, not fine. If you preach hatred from the Mosque, not fine. I will preach against you. That is my right. That is why America is a great country--not because people are compelled to think one "good" way, but because we are allowed to think any way we want. America is about the freedom to worship in any manner. In a sense, that freedom is the precursor to the "freedom to release under any license" as O'Reilly said. As long as we can agree to maintain that freedom, I have no quarrel with the Free Software movement. Unfortunately there are many in the movement who do not respect that freedom.
The argument that (misguided) BSD/anti-GPL fanatics make is that GPL is "less free" because you're not allowed to take my code, modify it, and sell it as proprietary software. The illogical conclusion then follows that GPL is about making it impossible to make money writing software. WRONG! GPL is about making it impossible to make money *selling* proprietary licenses for copies of the software. There's nothing preventing anyone from selling their labor as the cost of writing GPL'ed code ie.) making money by contracted development.
The production of cocaine, the marketing of crack, and the enforcement of drug laws really aren't about turning inner cities into war zones either, but that's what happens. However, people who make this argument are correct in one sense. The GPL is not strictly about making software an unprofitable business. It's about socializing software development.
Eliminating all proprietary software (whether 5 years or 50 years from now) is a very worthy goal. It's as simple as that
No it isn't. See? I can make assertions too.
Darwin isn't the hot ticket. It's the GUI that matters. Correct me if I'm wrong, but Darwin doesn't include the GUI.
I'm not usually one to nitpick over grammar, but I have to admit this bothers me too. The verb "to power" is evolving towards "to be a major integral part of". The first time I noticed this was "powered by Apache". IIRC, I went off on this, perhaps even on /.. "It's powered by electricity doofus, and that's powered mostly by coal in much of Virginia, and coal is mined by sweaty guys from West Virginia, so I'm going to put 'powered by sweaty guys from West Virginia' on my website".
So, what would be a concise alternative to "powered" in these situations? perhaps "iamipo" for Is A Major Integral Part Of. Slashdot. Iamipoed by Apache. Apache Iamipoes Slashdot. I iamipo, he iamipoes, you iamipo (yes I realize "to be" is irregular, but there is no good reason to introduce another irregular verb. If anything, the Ebonic use of "to be" should become the sanctioned usage to make English more learnable for the rest of the world). How's that?
Absolutely. For that matter, nobody held a gun to your head and made you drive. They do, however, hold a gun to your head if you don't pay your taxes and it was the oil-auto axis that corrupted the government into subsidizing roads more than rails. So, how do you break up the oil-auto-government monopoly? AFAIK, you can stage a tax revolt based on the percentage of your money being used to fund roads, but there isn't a strong enough groundswell yet to pull that off. Also, the damage has been done. We already live in suburbs with no rail service.
Just think. If Standard Oil had remained a monopoly, they might have charged confiscatory prices, and people might not have been so eager to move to Levitown. Cities might not have lost their tax base and declined into urban blight. The air might be a lot cleaner.
The last thing we need is for the government to "solve" the IT problems the way it "solved" the energy industry problems.
Well I am a US citizen, and I do have a right to complain--that they went after MS in the first place. Tell me, when are they going to go after Apple for their "monopoly on Motorola based PCs" which surely must be as bad as a "monopoly on Intel PCs". At least MSFT will sell you Windows for a price, and you can run virtual PC on a Mac. Apple won't sell you any version of their OS for x86. They just want to protect their Motorolla monopoly. I demand choice from Apple! I want my OS-X for x86 yesterday!!!
I'm serious; judge Jackson was way off the mark. Essentially, he narrowed the definition of "PC" to "x86 box". That was the only way there could be a "monopoly".
Essentially, what MSFT is trying to do is attach a little bit of self-replecating "DNA" to their IP. Whenever a cell is innoculated with MSFT's code, it becomes immune to the GPL virus.
So, if I have a BSD project and I link it to MSFT's code, its genetic makeup is slightly altered--it is now a mutant cell that produces the enzyme Microsoftase which breaks down radical Leftist subcultures... OK, at this point the analogy breaks down, but I think you get the idea.
Let me state with no equivocation that I LIKE THIS. The GPL-lovers with their twisted notion of freedom can whine all they want about this not being fair competition, but it is. I had been looking for ways to defeat the GPL without making it illegal (there is nothing that says you have to use MS file sharing systems, you can still use your own GPL'd file sharing system). This is the best idea I've seen yet. Now, it would be cool if some other people would release legal virii on the Open Source world--it could break the near monopoly that GPL has on OSS licenses.
That said, I don't like SW patents and hope that they don't rely too much on that technique. The GPL has threatened to use patents too (and has done so for the Mersenne Twister algorithm) IMHO, patents are the nuclear weapons in the GPL vs. Proprietary war. Let's both keep our fingers off the button. OK?
As every good Slashdrone knows, MSFT is the only entity that can steal intellectual "property". For everybody else, there is no such thing as intellectual property, and it's called "sharing". Thank you for reminding u--oh! That's the muezzin. Time to bow towards Cambridge and pray.
Of course it isn't complete though. The other day I started to vacuum the basement. The cleaner wasn't picking up much, so I examined the underside. The roller had a lot of threads and hair and stuff stuck to it. So I started to clean it. While I was cleaning it, the belt came off right in my hand. It had snapped, which explained why it wasn't working very well. I had never serviced a vacuum cleaner before. I examined the plastic cover, and much to my delight it was designed to snap off with the aid of a flat-bladed screwdriver. There were even handly little pictograms cast into the plastic that showed you where to pry. Once I had the motor shaft exposed, I knew I could replace the belt--if only I could find the right part. Here's the good part. I went to Fischer's Hardware. Not only is DIY and the mom-n-pop hardware store not dead, the mom-n-pop hardware store with no web presence of its own and nothing more than a listing with the chamber of commerce is not dead either. Fischer's has been in Springfield as long as I can remember, and I can remember a lot longer than I care to say. But wait, it gets better. Fischer's staff, unlike the huge box store staff, is always helpful. So I was not the least bit reluctant to walk in there with a broken belt and get either a replacement or a referral to someone who had a replacement (they referred for the fan motor for our bathroom). The guy in the vacuum department didn't have an official Hoover parts guide. When I said "do you need the model number" he gave me this look and said "don't get me started on model numbers". He took out some similar sized belts and started comparing them. When he found a close match, he handed me a Eureka belt and said "You can try this, and if it doesn't work use the yellow pages, get the part number from the mfct..." In other words, what I was too lazy to do in the first place and went to Fischer's to avoid doing. You can't get real-world expertise, honesty, and common sense like that from Home Depot. The belt was $2.18 and well... I had a coupon for $2.00. This was a no-brainer. Not having to track down a "genuine hoover part" was worth an $0.18 gamble. So I bought the little belt, got it home, and installed it. It was a little wider than the original belt, but it fit. The cleaner works fine now. I ran it for a good 15 minutes and there was no smoke or anything. Hopefully this fix will last, and even if it only lasts a few months I will happily buy another belt from the vacuum-cleaner hacker at Fischer's. That might cost more in the short run, but if Fischer's ever went away it would be a priceless loss.
If the primary product of combustion is CO2, you are OK becasue CO2 is a natural part of the carbon cycle--trees and phytoplankton turn it back into O2. So, as long as there are enough photosynthesizing organisms to complete the cycle, you can release all the CO2 you want.
I agree with the OP that H2 is another matter. Release twice the number of H atoms as there are O atoms, it all becomes water, and the only way to get the O2 back is by electrolysis or some other man-made process. As far as I know, there are no eletrolytic organisms or other natural process to get the O2 back, so we are screwed.
Of course there must be some natural process that liberates O2, otherwise the whole carbon cycle wouldn't have gotten set up in the first place. However, that O2 was probably liberated over a long period.
If we go to a H2 based fuel economy, perhaps we will need to have some kind of accounting for oxygen production. In other words, no license to produce H2 fuel unless you also release O2. This would be no problem for traditional H2 producers which (as far as I know) are using electrolysis and presumably putting O2 back into the system. It would only be a problem for "fossil H2" producers, who would have to find an O2 source.
Are you sure you don't mean Spider-Person? Or perhaps Spider-American or Arachno-American. Then of course there are those who believe it should be GNU/Spider.
Do you have a link for that? I'll have to listen very closely the next time I&S comes on. Maybe I should submit this to kissthisguy.com. Now, I wonder if I can fit the corrected version in the 120 character limit...
Amen. Geeks suck. I'm sick and tired of hearing about "geeks" who are great people because they can do drugs and get laid like all the other idiots on campus. I'd much rather be a sober nerd who can integrate the equations in the back of the book, and who gets married to the first woman he lays.
Windows 2000/XP/ME only. Win98 users need not apply.... onboard sound...
OK, forget about this board. It smells of planned obsolescence. The extra IDE slots are the bait. Almost everything else is a hook. What if I want to install DOS on this board. OK, probably not, but just knowing that I can is nice. Wintel boxes are nice because they are backwards compatable and give you a choice of what cards to use. If I wanted onboard everything and was never going to swap out or uprade, I'd get an iMac. Then of course there is the question that every /.er *must* ask: Did MS have a hand in making this not work with earlier versions of Windows?
I have been meaning to post parody signs, but I'm too lazy to do it. I was going to post: "Lose 30 dollars in 30 days, gauranteed. Call 1-800-FAT-SCAM". Would somebody please do this for me?
An "evil, aggressive, monopoly" can't sell stuff to people who don't want it. Will wonders never cease? Nevertheless, I think we need a few more years of litigation followed by government regulation to stop Hailstorm anyway. You know... just in case.
(close captioning for the sarcasm impaired: THAT WAS SARCASM. Thank-you.)
I wouldn't have any problem with teachers teaching about condoms if they also taught about the condom failure rate for which many reports are available. To drive the point home, perhaps the teachers could also have the students play a game. They could spin a wheel each day of class. If the wheel landed on the safe zone, they would get a free piece of candy. If it landed on the danger zone they would have to pay for all the candy they had eaten. At the 100 to 1 odds cited in the linked study, I wonder how many students would play the game.
There has to be a political solution.
Poltics is the art of compromise. Do you think it's a lost art? It's the art that's in the Constitution with regards to IP, and it's an art that can be redisovered. Maybe teachers are too busy teaching kids how to put on condoms to rediscover the Constitution. Why do you believe the outcome is going to be one-sided? Why do the RIAA or the AIP movement have to "win". If either side wins, everybody loses. It's just a different kind of loss.
I'm not so sure if we need a political solution anyway. If the RIAA really needs money to do things, and if they really can't stop people from stealing their music, then they will eventually run out of money and logicly, no longer be able to do things. If, in the mean time, they start punishing people who haven't done anything wrong, this will only accelerate the process. Why? Because I know that I, if punished for having done no crime, will be converted to the pirate camp. I suspect others will jump ship too, thus accelerating the process. If I have to deal with clunky built-in copy protection that makes it hard to work, that might easily be enough to push me over the line. It just depends on how much they are punishing me for having DONE NOTHING WRONG. It's only fair--if I have to do the time, I might as well do the crime.
OTOH, if someone can come up with a successful business model that's an alternative to what the RIAA offers, that will work too. Or, maybe the RIAA will actually do some kind of customer survey and discover that they really are losing customers because they are being dicks. That would tend to create non-extreme reform also.
That's why I hate DRM and Copyleft. They are both examples of extremism. If the Communists and the Fascists want to fight, why don't they just crater Europe again. Isn't that what it's there for? :)
The rich get richer by buying property and then renting it or selling it for much more than it originally cost them. Inventing new kinds of property (like copyrighted software, for instance) just gives them more opportunities.
Only half true. First, "the rich" is a misnomer. I was talking about the power elites. Driving a Mercedes does not make you a power elite. Owning half of Mercedes-Benz dramaticly increases the odds that you are a member of the power elite, though even that level of wealth is no gaurantee. BG does not present as a classic member of the power elite. The other half-truth here is that new revenue streams provide new opportunities for the power elites. The trouble is, they also provide opportunities for nouveau-riche guys like BG and the PEs hate that. So, the PEs are willing to do things like increase taxes or stifle IP if they believe it won't hurt them too much, all the while knowing that it will prevent new contenders from rising. That's whey the AIP movement is favored by the PEs.