Nonsense. I don't have the right to look at other people's source code.
Sure you do, if that code is under GPL
That's not a right. It's a privilidge given to me by the owner of that source code.
Nonsense, no one is forcing you to use GPL:d source code, but the FSF is trying to make sure you have that freedom
The FSF is forcing me to use GPLed source code if I create a derivitive work based on other GPLed source code. And while the FSF does try to give the end user freedom (to copy, to distribute, and to create derivitive works), it also tries to takes away freedom (to distribute binaries without distributing source code). Forcing one person to show something to another person does not increase freedom, it decreases it.
Of course not, and you are free to do what you like with your own code.
Nope, not true. I can't link my code with GPLed code and distribute it in binary only form.
You do not however have to right to take my (GPL:d) code and do what you like with that without complying with the GPL.
Go ahead. The moment you admit you did 56 in the 55 zone without a reasonable excuse to the judge (and "its just 1 mile over -- how unreasonable to pull me over" is simply not good enough, "I had to go to the washroom" holds more weight) you've broken the law and will be penalized for it.
I'm not arguing that. The original statement (not made by me, but I agree with it) was this:
When Lindows doesn't want to release the source until they ship the definite version, let them. If they don't want to release the beta version under the GPL let them! This was a beta version! What are we complaining about? What is wrong with not releasing the source right away?
The first part of the statement was "let them". I believe it was directed at the copyright holders. It's not a big deal. The lindows people are doing a positive thing for linux. If they delay the release of source for a few months, big deal.
The last part was "What is wrong". I believe this meant morally, what is wrong, not legally. Again, I agree. There is no moral responsibility for developers to give source code when they distribute software.
Besides that, the GPL says nothing about how quickly the source must be given. So it just might be legal as well as moral.
No, this is copyright law, and Lindows has no right to distribute any of the code at all unless they agree to the terms of the GPL.
And they have agreed to the GPL. So it's contract law.
It doesn't matter if they are calling it 'beta' or 'snozzberry', they still have to give the code to anyone who got a binary and asks for the code.
And I still have to pay a fine when I go 56 miles per hour in a 55 mile per hour zone. Doesn't mean the cop that pulls me over for it isn't a dickhead.
Nonsense. I don't have the right to look at other people's source code.
Would you rather use software where there's a large organization fighting for your rights or fighting to take them away?
My rights are mine, and there's nothing the FSF can do about them. The FSF fights for the rights of the copyright holders of the GPLed software to force their viewpoints upon others.
I don't think that the writers of software should be forced to release their source code. I certainly don't think that people have a right to force them to do so.
You can't let a potential offender, or for that matter, a potential victim, be the sole arbiter of what the law means.
Well, this is contract law, so you can and do allow the "victim" to override the law when its enforcement would be ridiculous. Also, it is up to the offender to determine whether or not the benefit from breaking the letter of the contract is worth the risk.
If Lindows feels this "law" is invalid, then they can follow their conscience and not obey it. But they sure as hell have no moral right to whine when someone calls them on it, or attempts to have the law enforced.
Well, I disagree. If I get fined for going 56 in a 55 mph zone, I sure as hell am going to whine and complain. Yes, the cop has a legal right to pull me over for speeding, but it's an unreasonable thing to do. And telling me "but what if you were going 80 miles per hour and there was a snowstorm and children playing" doesn't help the cops case any. Lindows claims they are going to release the source code shortly. If they don't, then we can argue the morality of that, but for now I don't think it makes sense to play the "what if" game.
How long do you wait until you conclude they aren't releasing beta code ever?
You use common sense. It's what separates us from computer programs, you know.
It's the same problem with the Sony Bono Copyright Act: Infinite and unlimited extensions make a mockery of any concept of "limited times" or of "eventually".
Good. You just argued my point. You can't look at the letter of the law ("limited times"). You have to look at the spirit of it. In this case, if they're going to release the source code in a relatively short period of time, they've complied with the spirit of the GPL, if not the letter of it.
"In a guest editorial on Newarchitect, Sarah Gordon looks at whether spam should be allowed and what steps could be taken to stop it. What's worrisome though is that restrictions on spam don't take into account who it's malicious against and what truly defines malicious." Note that she's not talking about actually sending spam, but merely making the text available for others to examine (and for some of them, no doubt, to try to spread in the wild).
Whoever runs alterslash is a dirty thief though...
And I think it's a perfect example of fair use... The purpose and character is non-commercial news and education. The nature is a published document freely distributed over the internet. The amount and substantiality is minor; slashdot owns copyright in about 1% of the work. The effect of the use on the potential market is minor.
Apples and oranges... Google's bread and butter is their patented PageRank technology, which they license for what I'm sure is a lot of money.
And VA Software's bread and butter is SourceForge Enterprise Edition and SourceForge Portal Edition, which I'm sure they license for a lot of money.
The people that screamed so loud about how long it took./ to release the source for slash are now bitching about subscriptions and banner ads..
Which people would that be? Name one. I certainly never bitched about slash. It's complete shit.
Hopefully./ will wise up and figure out if they ever want to make any real money they'll have to offer a real service.
Exactly. Banner ads stuck on other people's content isn't going to make a company. Open content licensing the content would drastically reduce the costs. Slashdot is never going to be more than a loss leader, no matter how big the ads get. Unless they revert back to BBS style. 2 or 3 employees, relying on the volunteer help of the community. But it's probably too late for even that. Most of the user's know they sold out.
I'd be perfectly willing to subscribe if I got XML data. It's not about the ads, as you've said there are plenty of easier ways to get rid of ads (I use mozilla). It's about being able to write a PHP script to show replies to my posts on my PDA. It's about coming up with my own arbitrary moderation scheme (automatically -1 posts with the word "unconstitutional" in it).
Some unscrupulous players could surely abuse this by 'making their own' search engines that essentially rip off google without any hassle what so ever?
Yahoo hasn't had enough problems with it to take it down. It's really nice being able to make my own PHP script to display customized stock quotes on my PDA.
Slashdot Mirror
Nonsense. I don't have the right to look at other people's source code.
Sure you do, if that code is under GPL
That's not a right. It's a privilidge given to me by the owner of that source code.
Nonsense, no one is forcing you to use GPL:d source code, but the FSF is trying to make sure you have that freedom
The FSF is forcing me to use GPLed source code if I create a derivitive work based on other GPLed source code. And while the FSF does try to give the end user freedom (to copy, to distribute, and to create derivitive works), it also tries to takes away freedom (to distribute binaries without distributing source code). Forcing one person to show something to another person does not increase freedom, it decreases it.
Of course not, and you are free to do what you like with your own code.
Nope, not true. I can't link my code with GPLed code and distribute it in binary only form.
You do not however have to right to take my (GPL:d) code and do what you like with that without complying with the GPL.
And that's what I'm complaining about.
Go ahead. The moment you admit you did 56 in the 55 zone without a reasonable excuse to the judge (and "its just 1 mile over -- how unreasonable to pull me over" is simply not good enough, "I had to go to the washroom" holds more weight) you've broken the law and will be penalized for it.
I'm not arguing that. The original statement (not made by me, but I agree with it) was this:
The first part of the statement was "let them". I believe it was directed at the copyright holders. It's not a big deal. The lindows people are doing a positive thing for linux. If they delay the release of source for a few months, big deal.
The last part was "What is wrong". I believe this meant morally, what is wrong, not legally. Again, I agree. There is no moral responsibility for developers to give source code when they distribute software.
Besides that, the GPL says nothing about how quickly the source must be given. So it just might be legal as well as moral.
No, this is copyright law, and Lindows has no right to distribute any of the code at all unless they agree to the terms of the GPL.
And they have agreed to the GPL. So it's contract law.
It doesn't matter if they are calling it 'beta' or 'snozzberry', they still have to give the code to anyone who got a binary and asks for the code.
And I still have to pay a fine when I go 56 miles per hour in a 55 mile per hour zone. Doesn't mean the cop that pulls me over for it isn't a dickhead.
while the FSF is fighting for your rights
Nonsense. I don't have the right to look at other people's source code.
Would you rather use software where there's a large organization fighting for your rights or fighting to take them away?
My rights are mine, and there's nothing the FSF can do about them. The FSF fights for the rights of the copyright holders of the GPLed software to force their viewpoints upon others.
I don't think that the writers of software should be forced to release their source code. I certainly don't think that people have a right to force them to do so.
I'll take the FSF, thank you.
The lesser of two evils is still an evil.
You can't let a potential offender, or for that matter, a potential victim, be the sole arbiter of what the law means.
Well, this is contract law, so you can and do allow the "victim" to override the law when its enforcement would be ridiculous. Also, it is up to the offender to determine whether or not the benefit from breaking the letter of the contract is worth the risk.
If Lindows feels this "law" is invalid, then they can follow their conscience and not obey it. But they sure as hell have no moral right to whine when someone calls them on it, or attempts to have the law enforced.
Well, I disagree. If I get fined for going 56 in a 55 mph zone, I sure as hell am going to whine and complain. Yes, the cop has a legal right to pull me over for speeding, but it's an unreasonable thing to do. And telling me "but what if you were going 80 miles per hour and there was a snowstorm and children playing" doesn't help the cops case any. Lindows claims they are going to release the source code shortly. If they don't, then we can argue the morality of that, but for now I don't think it makes sense to play the "what if" game.
How long do you wait until you conclude they aren't releasing beta code ever?
You use common sense. It's what separates us from computer programs, you know.
It's the same problem with the Sony Bono Copyright Act: Infinite and unlimited extensions make a mockery of any concept of "limited times" or of "eventually".
Good. You just argued my point. You can't look at the letter of the law ("limited times"). You have to look at the spirit of it. In this case, if they're going to release the source code in a relatively short period of time, they've complied with the spirit of the GPL, if not the letter of it.
But what if there is never a final release?
And what if the co-founder takes a gun and starts shooting people?
Answer: we'll burn that bridge when we get to it.
Really, sometimes the FSF can be as bad as the BSA...
"In a guest editorial on Newarchitect, Sarah Gordon looks at whether spam should be allowed and what steps could be taken to stop it. What's worrisome though is that restrictions on spam don't take into account who it's malicious against and what truly defines malicious." Note that she's not talking about actually sending spam, but merely making the text available for others to examine (and for some of them, no doubt, to try to spread in the wild).
FYI:
We like them Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.
We love them Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday.
And we alternate Sundays.
Get with the program.
--
---
Those other browsers must suck
That's just the headlines... Pretty useless...
Looks fine in Mozilla 0.9.9, too...
Or are you suggesting that if you don't find the security holes, that they aren't there?
How long until slashdot offers this service?
"Globalism, Corporatism and Open Source"
Nuff said...
So you think that anyone who leaves his door unlocked at night deserves what they get?
Huh? Popups? What are popups?
Whoever runs alterslash is a dirty thief though...
And I think it's a perfect example of fair use... The purpose and character is non-commercial news and education. The nature is a published document freely distributed over the internet. The amount and substantiality is minor; slashdot owns copyright in about 1% of the work. The effect of the use on the potential market is minor.
Apples and oranges... Google's bread and butter is their patented PageRank technology, which they license for what I'm sure is a lot of money.
And VA Software's bread and butter is SourceForge Enterprise Edition and SourceForge Portal Edition, which I'm sure they license for a lot of money.
The people that screamed so loud about how long it took ./ to release the source for slash are now bitching about subscriptions and banner ads..
Which people would that be? Name one. I certainly never bitched about slash. It's complete shit.
Hopefully ./ will wise up and figure out if they ever want to make any real money they'll have to offer a real service.
Exactly. Banner ads stuck on other people's content isn't going to make a company. Open content licensing the content would drastically reduce the costs. Slashdot is never going to be more than a loss leader, no matter how big the ads get. Unless they revert back to BBS style. 2 or 3 employees, relying on the volunteer help of the community. But it's probably too late for even that. Most of the user's know they sold out.
As John Lennon said, "the dream is over".
The very idea of making this service analogous to what you are stealing from slashdot is ridiculous.
I'm not stealing anything. The site I link to in my signature is not one I run, though it's one I support whole-heartedly.
I'd be perfectly willing to subscribe if I got XML data. It's not about the ads, as you've said there are plenty of easier ways to get rid of ads (I use mozilla). It's about being able to write a PHP script to show replies to my posts on my PDA. It's about coming up with my own arbitrary moderation scheme (automatically -1 posts with the word "unconstitutional" in it).
Some unscrupulous players could surely abuse this by 'making their own' search engines that essentially rip off google without any hassle what so ever?
Yahoo hasn't had enough problems with it to take it down. It's really nice being able to make my own PHP script to display customized stock quotes on my PDA.
That's just the headlines... I want messages... moderations... articles... everything...