> then assert copyright on the artistic assets like textures, sound, music, character design, etc. You would be charging for your ideas, not for your software, if that makes sense, and users would not be able to freely distribute the artistic assets. I think that's a fine compromise between making money and being moral.
So the RIAA is moral? Wow I am surprised that you said that. Phew...
After all what the RIAA and others are doing is asserting copyright on the artistic assets like... music....
Glad all of Open Source will see your perspective...
Ok, here is the situation (whether you like it or not.) Microsoft is a dominate operating system company and their influence is everywhere. Regardless of the fact of how or why or when this happened this is how it is.
With the situation being as it is there are two things you can do. Fight it tooth and nail, or just accept it and deal with it. You say fight it tooth and nail. Yet the Linux vendors (who happened to be earning real money) are saying, lets deal with it, and accept as part of the landscape.
Me I say let's deal with it because I have no intention on being a martyr, or wasting my breath. Life is literally too short. Heck with Microsoft trying to play nice with Linux there is a market opportunity. Think about why Microsoft and Linux is getting along so well... Think hard... Its Apple! So since I am no fan of Apple, one could use the opportunity to grow Linux while Microsoft sees this as an advantage.
Wow, its amazing how people forget history. Japan WAS ripping off. I know I and my family was working in the car industry during that time. They might not have ripped off the North Americans, but they most certainly did rip off the Europeans. Look at the Japanese models around that time and then look at the Europeans. Similar models. If I may be blunt the Japanese copied the looks of BMW, Porsche, and Mercedes (lesser Mercedes).
Another example is machines like lathes, milling machines, robots, etc. Germany and Switzerland used to have a good business there. Then along came the Japanese and ripped them off. Most of the German machines are history now because they could not compete against the Japanese who undercut on price alone.
What gets me is this revisionism in North America and how North America blindly has forgotten how Japanese used to run around on world fairs with camera's in hand.... Do I sound angry, yeah, I am because I was affected.
Yes if those are your poster boys for Open Source = business making money I think it says quite a bit.
Let's compare this to companies that either sell software only or software as a service with no sources.
Google, Yahoo, Symantec, Microsoft, Amazon, SAP, Oracle, and so on. These companies are BILLION dollar companies, and IBM while a billion dollar company is more hardware and services. If Redhat, and Suse after a decade are not even reaching the billion dollar mark. And IBM, well they are doing ok, but have not grown their income as much as Open Source should have.
No, I think the grand parent poster is right. Open Source as a business model is not changing the game...
I call BS! There have been studies that say overweight = unhealthy, but they are misguided.
From all of the studies that I have seen figuring out whether you are healthy or not CANNOT and I repeat CANNOT be determined by a single number.
It has been pointed out by numerous doctors time and time again that being overweight while exercising and eating healthy is no worse than having an ideal BMI and not exercising. The studies that say otherwise don't isolate the cases that I am talking about. And there are people who can be overweight and nothing is wrong with them, and then there are people who die early EVEN though they were ideal weight.
The body is a funny thing, and not identical. Let me give you an example, George Burns: Lived to be a hundred, but drank and smoked cigars. Sure in moderation, but according to the new insurance policies he would have to pay more. Yes there are examples to the contrary, but what if you are the one who has to pay extra money even though you will live to be a 100?
This relationship of overweight/obese = unhealthy is a ploy by the insurance companies to squeeze more money out of people. I knew we would reach this point. Ever since companies and people called a war against smokers I said, "this is a slippery slope, who's next overweight?" This slippery slope is going to get worse. For example, I can imagine now that insurance companies will force you to pay more if you sky dive, or do any extreme sports. Don't believe me? In Germany some private health providers are refusing coverage if you get injured doing sports of higher risk. Explain that to me. I am sure that the person who is doing the sports is in pretty good shape, yet by refusing coverage they are saying. "We want people who will not cost anything."
That's why I wish the insurance companies would come clean and say that they are only interested in maintaining profit! And that's why I support universal health care, probably government managed. Because one of these days I am going to get whacked for my bum right knee (For reference I jog 3 times a week 10K)
Not surprising because we are moving away from "hobbies" to "packages."
By hobbies I mean how many new dot coms are being created? How many people are creating new and nifty content? Some sure, but the vast majority of folks are companies that see the web as a necessity and not a money maker.
The innovative companies need flexibility, power and tunability, which is given by Apache, and the LAMP stack. The corporations that see the web as a necessity just want to put information onto the Internet. They don't care about "social networks." They just care that their catalog can be viewed. And that is the domain of Microsoft, not Apache.
I personally see these statistics as a maturation of the web, not that Apache is loosing market share.
- Jackson Pollack died 1956 - Andy Warhol started his stuff in the 50's, and the Pop art movement started in the 50's (UK). - Rothko paintings in the 1950's... - Francais Bacon 53... - conceptualism became popular in the 60's, but first reared its head in 1917 by DuChamp.
and the list goes on... And my point is still valid...
What I think you might be thinking about is that in the 60's the art center moved from Paris to New York and thus you might get the impression that many modern art movements started in 60's and later.
The only one I will concede is minimalism... It did start in the 60's...
My point is that there are very few truly innovative artists pushing the boundaries. The last truly interesting and unique artist I ran into was this Dutch guy who created walking tubes that worked by the power of the wind. Truly neat and interesting...
>And in 10 years, someone just like you will be writing, "the 00's? Alternative... but the '10's? Who is any good? NOBODY. Yeah, there are okay artists today, but nothing like the ones we had just ten years ago."
Wrong.... When Michael Jackson was big people knew Michael Jackson would be big. You knew it during his day. When the Who was big you knew that the Who remain big. Queen? U2? When Elton John was big you knew that he would be big. The list continues, Whitney Houston, Celine Dione, etc, etc.
#1 is Various artists... #2 is sound track to hair spray #3 is Prince, and well he doesn't count. #4...
Look at the charts and you would be very hard pressed to find those artists that will stand the test of time. Linken Park maybe.. A couple of others maybe as well. But there are none that scream, "I AM SO GOOD that I will be listened to in 20 years..."
The Internet is not increasing diversity because if it were iTunes would not be #1. The reality is that people are sucking up more packaged artists by the day.
>more widely spent, meaning fewer mega-rock-stars.
Missing the point of Elton John again. Elton John was talking about quality, not mega stars. There are plenty of mega stars... Just not very good mega stars.
> I'd argue that finding new music and downloading it from the web requires more creativity and deciding what your interests really are. Experiencing things that are not packaged in nice neat bundles is a good description of what they are already doing. Elton John can too, if he puts a little time and effort into it.
I would counter that argument in that nobody is doing what you are saying. If they were then there would be more sites to download music. Yet where do most people buy their music? iTunes!!! So if your music ain't on iTunes it ain't anywhere...
In my original posting I said that there were good bands... BUT, and this is the big difference they are not coming to the foreground in popularity. What you may like is probably esoteric and I could argue horrible, but you like it and that is ok. What I am arguing about is pop music... Pop music was better...
What I am tired of is people who don't look at history, or read the freaken article. EJ is not saying that he hates the Internet because he is not making enough money. Elton John a few years ago said he quite recording. What Elton John is saying is that he is tired of the lack of creativity that the Internet is spawning. In fact on that level he is 100% right.
Let me compare this to something I am much more aware of visual art:
There have been many art movements: expressionism, surrealism, abstract, etc. Yet all of these movements predate 1950! Since the 60's there has been no major visual art movement in anything! It is a rehash of everything we have done in the past. If anything this era is predicated on taking the stuff already thought of and mixing it up. You could argue that, the act of mashing up art is a new art movement. Though I would agree with Elton John in that there is very little new ideas and thoughts coming up in art.
In music I have been watching the VH-1 classic music channel, and it is interesting: 50-60's rock, 70's hippies, 80's bad hair day, 90's all against the world, 2000's? Paris Hilton? Britany Spears? You have got to be kidding me. Yes there are good artists in 2000, but they are not gaining the traction that good artists used to get. It seems that the people are not interested in quality, but quantity, and that I feel is the problem Elton John is harping on.
He talked about getting rid of the Internet, would that be a bad idea? Considering that I make my money with the Internet I actually think it is a good idea. I grew up loving the outdoors since I grew up in cottage country (late 80's early 90's). Yes we had video games, and electronics, but it did not match up the excitement of windsurfing, fishing, ice skating, swimming, water skiing, etc. Yet how many kids do that these days? In Canada recently they discovered that young kids do move around quite a bit. It is once they reach the teens that they stop doing anything. Once teens becomes teens only 15% remain active. That has to scare you quite a bit. And what it implies is that teens don't use their brains anymore. They just consume, consume, consume... Creativity comes from having to exercise your brains and experiencing things that are not packaged in nice neat bundles.
Wanna know why people are breaking traffic laws? BECAUSE THEY ARE DAMM STUPID when applied the way they are in North America.
1) Stop signs: Why must every corner have a stop sign? You drive five meters and oops another stop sign. Europe was smarter in that they actually use the YIELD sign! When was the last time the yield sign was used in North America?
2) Stop lights: North America if it is not in love with the stop sign happens, then becomes in love with the stop light. Ever heard of a round-about? Britain has quite a few, and now mainland Europe is building them everywhere because they are efficient at keeping traffic moving.
3) Speed Limit: In some corners of North America the speed limit is so freaken low it ain't even funny. In Europe depending on the country if you can drive faster they let you drive faster. The speed limit is fitted so that traffic can keep moving. And if traffic should slow down then well many cities have changing speed limits and traffic is slowed down.
Quotas: Absolutely police have quotas. If the police REALLY cared about stopping bad behavior then they would stop reckless driving. But of course that is harder to catch and requires being on guard and active. Yet speeding is easy. Sit in a corner and wait!
So while I don't blame the individual policeperson, I do blame the freaken system since it is so much out of whack.
* Constructive: I looked at your code. Here is what is good. And here are the reasons why I am apprehensive about it. The problem that I have is that if I included the code there would be some serious ramifications namely XYZ.
Here is what most people cannot do. They cannot be constructive because using the arguments they proposed in the constructive it would imply that they would have to change their opinion. Thus people resort to "This code sucks."
Having written code and looked at code it is hard to have to change your opinion. We all too often fall into a trap, "this is how I did it and thus this is how everyone will do it." I suspect Linus feel into this trap because Con annoyed him personally....
Ah ok a solution is better... We use that solution, right? Because after all is that not what Open Source is all about? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meritocracy)
Meritocracy is a system of government or other organization based on demonstrated ability (merit) and talent rather than by wealth (plutocracy), family connections (nepotism), class privilege, cronyism, popularity (as in democracy) or other historical determinants of social position and political power.
>Ingo is orders of magnitude a better programmer than Con, orders of magnitude more knowledgeable, he gets paid to do the work, has gotten along with Linus for years, and will eventually make CFS as good as SD and even better.
Ok so demonstrated was a scheduler that was better, but chosen was somebody who is perceived as being more knowledgeable, and gets along with Linus and EVENTUALLY will make CFS as good or better... And until EVENTUALLY hits I should wait around and suffer the problems? And how is this different from say Microsoft who refuses to fix bugs?
Let's call this what it is! Corporatism at the open source level with Linus's nepotism!
I have no idea if you are being sarcastic or serious. Ok let's assume serious.
So what you are saying is that people are being self-interested and thus not paying for the software. And by contributing to a pot to further software it is being communist? Assuming that is what you are saying then I can only say, you have made the argument why Free software will not succeed.
Here is the problem, when something is free the amount of effort people will exert to help it along is minimal. Self-interest as you call it. If people have to pay for something then they will be careful about how they use and will complain if something went wrong. That complaint fosters bug fixes, updates, etc. When I have a problem with Open Source who do I call? The answer most Open Source people have, "you have the sources fix it." Oh yeah? Really? And if I post a question on the mailing lists that are newbie in nature what is the answer? Read the FAQ or the news groups.
Again the person who is lazy is being self-interested, and the person replying with buzz off is being self-interested. End result person does not want the hassle, lays out 100 USD for Windows and gets a system that can print, scan, without problems...
BTW Open Source works because people are not being self-interested. If you read many of the open source docs from the Free Software foundation they talk about the commons and how people should work together...
>But I view this as a drain on the rest of the economy.
Let's look at economics and ask is it a drain on the rest of society? Answer no, because from 1990 to say 1995 the software industry grew by bounds and leaps. The software economy is a real economy. For example do you consider it a drain that you have to pay for clothes, food, cars, houses, etc? No because you factor it in.
>Just think about how many web startups are using a LAMP stack... would their businesses be possible in a purely commercial software world?
Here is where I argue that you need to take a good close look at history. The web came into force say 1995-1997. Around this time there was no LAMP stack. The web server of choice was NCSA, and most of the web applications were run using PERL. PHP started around 1995, but did not catch on in a major way until say 1997, 1998. Around this time the web was already taking off in a major way.
The development stack was a hodge podge of tools and utilities, and it was costly because around this time SUN made billions selling extremely expensive servers to dot.com's. So if you say free software will dominate, then I would counter and say during the dot.com heyday companies that sold expensive hardware and services like Sun made oodles of money.
The LAMP stack did not get full attention until say 2000-2001 when the dot.com bubble was bursting, and people could not afford the Sun boxes or the expensive other services. With LAMP people could create software without paying a dime. So what came out of the web infrastructure since 2001? Actually not much. Web services, Ajax, HTTP 1.1, XML, what have you it was developed during the dotcom era. Since 2001 we have had adoption of the concepts developed pre-2001, which is good, but that does not build an ecosystem.
> because in the long term how can something be more attractive than free
Easy answer, when free does not do what you want it to. Let's be real about this, Windows costs around 100 USD per license. Does 100 USD really kill you? Maybe in developing countries, but developing countries have their own distributions. If for a 100 USD my computer can print, scan, play audio without any problems whatsoever then I would fork over the 100 USD because I don't feel like twiddling around. This is what Linux on the desktop promoters are missing. It is not just a matter of creating a stable and robust desktop, but to get a desktop that does what I want it to.
Linux had a window of opportunity before Vista was released. They squandered, and now that door is shut!
Until the release of Vista I used to be a very very big supporter of Linux and open source. I still use Linux on our servers, but for the desktop I have conceded defeat!
You mean the guy who did not have the senses to think big volume? The guy who was too dumb to see a good thing when he had it?
>Oh please. The PC up until maybe 5-10 years ago was anything but innovative. The Amiga and Mac in the 80s were light years ahead of the PC in both hardware and software.
I have no idea how old you are, but having gone through the Vic20, Pet, and many other computers the PC did one thing that all of these other computers did not. They made the computer a commodity. It was truly amazing. The PC provided a platform for general purpose computing. It was not flashy, but it worked.
To illustrate how old I am, when I was using the Pet and C64 in high school the network was called Kermit and to write to a floppy over the Kermit network you had to literally yell, "Writing on disk." Otherwise two computers would overwrite each others work. The Vic, the Amiga, and Mac had flashy graphics, but they forced you to go down their route. Mac meant Mac hardware and at the time things were pricy! It's not like today where you can pick up a 250 GB harddisk for a couple of hundred bucks! At that time harddisks cost thousands of dollars...
Software? Ha! Dream on... Learned how to write your own basic code? No the PC was a revolution and innovative due to its shear simplicity...
I have gone through the Microsoft era, Unix era, Open Source era, Java era, and so on. YES I am a gray beard like the original grand parent poster. And if there is one thing that Microsoft has learned and keeps on propagating is that you can make money with Microsoft. This is not something to treat lightly.
I will give you another example; AutoCad. They are essentially the last standing CAD software. Yes there are others, but none as popular as AutoCad. Why? Well one reason is that you could copy it. BUT another bigger reason was that from day 1 AutoCad could be extended so that you could add value to AutoCad. AutoCad created an environment where people could prosper and thus secured their place in history.
Open Source did get one thing right in that they solved problems that people were having. Open Source did not focus on features. What Open Source got wrong is making money for people. The environment around Open Source is a cheapskate environment. Redhat offered Fedora because people stopped buying Redhat Linux. People did not buy software, and to this day still don't buy software. You have more people using for free than adding to the ecosystem, and that hurts!
Yes there are big companies using and supporting Linux. BUT add together the economies around Microsoft and I would not hesitate to use trillions of dollars. First you have Microsoft, then you have people selling software for Windows, then you have consultancies supporting Windows, then you have custom coders for Microsoft, then you have conferences, then you have trainers, etc, etc. It is an incredibly HUGE ecosystem that is profitable for everybody involved.
If you look at the latest incomes of the Open Source vendors it is down right disappointing after a decade of potential. For crying out loud Ubuntu is the result of a guy who made his money with something else and is supporting Ubuntu because he wants to have fun!
If Linux and Open Source REALLY want to beat Microsoft, then Open Source folks should STOP BEING DAMM CHEAPSKATES! I am sure everybody is capable of forking over 50 USD per year. If we use a conservative number of 1 million users world wide that would mean 50 million dollars income and that would mean a heck of a lot programmers could be hired to solve those darn user interface problems!
Do I buy and support software? Absolutely, as a matter of principle because I earn my money from software.
Having and still using three systems; OSX, Linux, and Windows I think Linux on the desktop is not going anywhere. Yes you can mod me down as flamebait, but I have waited for the longest time to get a usable Linux on the desktop. Linux for programming is fantastic. It does things how I expect it to be.
Though Linux on the desktop for "easy" jobs like mail its ok as well. But here are the issues I just keep running into.
1) Media is choppy. I keep having problems where I can't listen to multiple streams at once. Let's say I am watching a DVD, put it on pause and then want to listen to a podcast. I get audio device errors galore.
2) If I compile something heavy duty and then want to watch a DVD, no can do, even though I multi-core CPU. Windows? No problem I regularly run big simulations on one CPU, while watching a DVD at the same time.
3) Get me a decent word processor, and spreadsheet. NO Open Office is not it. AbiWord is actually pretty good for basic tasks, but fails for anything beyond that.
4) Get me a printer that actually works! I am not kidding on this one. I can't print documents for the life of me. Yes blame it on the printer companies, but the end result is that I can't print, and I am not about to write my own printer software.
5) Get me a scanner software that actually works well. I have this old Cannon scanner that I can't get to work for the life of me. Windows a snap.
6) SKYPE? That's a joke. Try watching a DVD, and speaking at the same time? Or compiling or speaking at the same time. For reasons that are beyond me SKYPE goes choppy at times so that I have use Windows.
The interesting thing is that quite a few of these peeves were touched upon by Con Kolivas, who complained that Linux on the Desktop is getting no love whatsoever. Even on OSX I have some of these problems. On Windows? No problem whatsoever. So why should I beat myself on the head with Linux? Linux on the server is great, don't get me wrong. But on the desktop? Forget about it...
You can debate, argue, point all one wants. BUT the reality of the matter is that people seem to continue buying Windows, year after year. Some of that may be lock in, but I doubt 100% of that is lock in. Thus when everything is done and said, maybe there might be a few million people who actually prefer Windows...
There is no difference in the RIAA/MPAA and the Free Software Foundation. You talk about fair use. If a company used fair use in their software would you find that acceptable? For example, let's say that Microsoft were to use parts of the scheduler in their Windows software. That could fall under fair use since the scheduler is a small piece in comparison to the everything else. How would you feel if companies do that?
After all when you use fair use you are not giving all of the money that the copyright license could earn.
My point has been since the Free Software Foundation dictates their terms using the copyright law, the RIAA/MPAA have the same right to dictate their terms. You might not agree with the RIAA/MPAA terms, and might agree with the FSF, but that is beside the point. The main argument is that if you support strong support of the GPL like the German courts did, then you have to support strong use by the RIAA/MPAA. Doing otherwise would be hypocritical.
Dude, I wish I had points to give you. You just nailed the topic, and oddly many don't seem to get it. I use both Windows, and Ubuntu and while Ubuntu is nice for developing it sucks for doing video or audio. For example say I am running a DVD, and then want to listen to a podcast. Not at the same time, but I stop the DVD, and listen to the podcast. I get an error, "Could not access device." This is completely bogus. I have to close my DVD app to listen to a podcast.
It is these little things that drive me bonkers on the desktop... Linux as a server is great, desktop... well... Con Kolivas ain't calling it end game for nothing...
>>You know, that company who has PC Manufacturers pay for Windows for each PC it sells, even if it runs Linux... yeah, I know, they're not forcing this down their throat, it's just that if they don't comply they get to pay 3 times more.
So don't buy from those manufacturers! That is my point. If you don't like how Microsoft does things, then don't support the Microsoft infrastructure. Buy OSX, buy Linux, and don't use a single piece of Microsoft software. The kicker here is that people DON'T CARE... That's why Microsoft continues to make profit...
Slashdot Mirror
> then assert copyright on the artistic assets like textures, sound, music, character design, etc. You would be charging for your ideas, not for your software, if that makes sense, and users would not be able to freely distribute the artistic assets. I think that's a fine compromise between making money and being moral.
So the RIAA is moral? Wow I am surprised that you said that. Phew...
After all what the RIAA and others are doing is asserting copyright on the artistic assets like... music....
Glad all of Open Source will see your perspective...
Ok, here is the situation (whether you like it or not.) Microsoft is a dominate operating system company and their influence is everywhere. Regardless of the fact of how or why or when this happened this is how it is.
With the situation being as it is there are two things you can do. Fight it tooth and nail, or just accept it and deal with it. You say fight it tooth and nail. Yet the Linux vendors (who happened to be earning real money) are saying, lets deal with it, and accept as part of the landscape.
Me I say let's deal with it because I have no intention on being a martyr, or wasting my breath. Life is literally too short. Heck with Microsoft trying to play nice with Linux there is a market opportunity. Think about why Microsoft and Linux is getting along so well... Think hard... Its Apple! So since I am no fan of Apple, one could use the opportunity to grow Linux while Microsoft sees this as an advantage.
Wow, its amazing how people forget history. Japan WAS ripping off. I know I and my family was working in the car industry during that time. They might not have ripped off the North Americans, but they most certainly did rip off the Europeans. Look at the Japanese models around that time and then look at the Europeans. Similar models. If I may be blunt the Japanese copied the looks of BMW, Porsche, and Mercedes (lesser Mercedes).
Another example is machines like lathes, milling machines, robots, etc. Germany and Switzerland used to have a good business there. Then along came the Japanese and ripped them off. Most of the German machines are history now because they could not compete against the Japanese who undercut on price alone.
What gets me is this revisionism in North America and how North America blindly has forgotten how Japanese used to run around on world fairs with camera's in hand.... Do I sound angry, yeah, I am because I was affected.
Though now I look at China and just laugh...
(What goes around, comes around...)
I am glad you mentioned them:
Yes if those are your poster boys for Open Source = business making money I think it says quite a bit.
Let's compare this to companies that either sell software only or software as a service with no sources.
Google, Yahoo, Symantec, Microsoft, Amazon, SAP, Oracle, and so on. These companies are BILLION dollar companies, and IBM while a billion dollar company is more hardware and services. If Redhat, and Suse after a decade are not even reaching the billion dollar mark. And IBM, well they are doing ok, but have not grown their income as much as Open Source should have.
No, I think the grand parent poster is right. Open Source as a business model is not changing the game...
Oh yeah!
Well your girlfriend wears Army Boots!
I call BS! There have been studies that say overweight = unhealthy, but they are misguided.
From all of the studies that I have seen figuring out whether you are healthy or not CANNOT and I repeat CANNOT be determined by a single number.
It has been pointed out by numerous doctors time and time again that being overweight while exercising and eating healthy is no worse than having an ideal BMI and not exercising. The studies that say otherwise don't isolate the cases that I am talking about. And there are people who can be overweight and nothing is wrong with them, and then there are people who die early EVEN though they were ideal weight.
The body is a funny thing, and not identical. Let me give you an example, George Burns: Lived to be a hundred, but drank and smoked cigars. Sure in moderation, but according to the new insurance policies he would have to pay more. Yes there are examples to the contrary, but what if you are the one who has to pay extra money even though you will live to be a 100?
This relationship of overweight/obese = unhealthy is a ploy by the insurance companies to squeeze more money out of people. I knew we would reach this point. Ever since companies and people called a war against smokers I said, "this is a slippery slope, who's next overweight?" This slippery slope is going to get worse. For example, I can imagine now that insurance companies will force you to pay more if you sky dive, or do any extreme sports. Don't believe me? In Germany some private health providers are refusing coverage if you get injured doing sports of higher risk. Explain that to me. I am sure that the person who is doing the sports is in pretty good shape, yet by refusing coverage they are saying. "We want people who will not cost anything."
That's why I wish the insurance companies would come clean and say that they are only interested in maintaining profit! And that's why I support universal health care, probably government managed. Because one of these days I am going to get whacked for my bum right knee (For reference I jog 3 times a week 10K)
Not surprising because we are moving away from "hobbies" to "packages."
By hobbies I mean how many new dot coms are being created? How many people are creating new and nifty content? Some sure, but the vast majority of folks are companies that see the web as a necessity and not a money maker.
The innovative companies need flexibility, power and tunability, which is given by Apache, and the LAMP stack. The corporations that see the web as a necessity just want to put information onto the Internet. They don't care about "social networks." They just care that their catalog can be viewed. And that is the domain of Microsoft, not Apache.
I personally see these statistics as a maturation of the web, not that Apache is loosing market share.
My comment: Since the 60's...
This means from 1960 onwards....
- Jackson Pollack died 1956
- Andy Warhol started his stuff in the 50's, and the Pop art movement started in the 50's (UK).
- Rothko paintings in the 1950's...
- Francais Bacon 53...
- conceptualism became popular in the 60's, but first reared its head in 1917 by DuChamp.
and the list goes on... And my point is still valid...
What I think you might be thinking about is that in the 60's the art center moved from Paris to New York and thus you might get the impression that many modern art movements started in 60's and later.
The only one I will concede is minimalism... It did start in the 60's...
My point is that there are very few truly innovative artists pushing the boundaries. The last truly interesting and unique artist I ran into was this Dutch guy who created walking tubes that worked by the power of the wind. Truly neat and interesting...
>And in 10 years, someone just like you will be writing, "the 00's? Alternative... but the '10's? Who is any good? NOBODY. Yeah, there are okay artists today, but nothing like the ones we had just ten years ago."
a y.jsp?g=Albums&f=The+Billboard+200
Wrong.... When Michael Jackson was big people knew Michael Jackson would be big. You knew it during his day. When the Who was big you knew that the Who remain big. Queen? U2? When Elton John was big you knew that he would be big. The list continues, Whitney Houston, Celine Dione, etc, etc.
Ok, so who is it today? Let's look at the music charts: http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/charts/chart_displ
#1 is Various artists...
#2 is sound track to hair spray
#3 is Prince, and well he doesn't count.
#4...
Look at the charts and you would be very hard pressed to find those artists that will stand the test of time. Linken Park maybe.. A couple of others maybe as well. But there are none that scream, "I AM SO GOOD that I will be listened to in 20 years..."
The Internet is not increasing diversity because if it were iTunes would not be #1. The reality is that people are sucking up more packaged artists by the day.
>more widely spent, meaning fewer mega-rock-stars.
Missing the point of Elton John again. Elton John was talking about quality, not mega stars. There are plenty of mega stars... Just not very good mega stars.
> I'd argue that finding new music and downloading it from the web requires more creativity and deciding what your interests really are. Experiencing things that are not packaged in nice neat bundles is a good description of what they are already doing. Elton John can too, if he puts a little time and effort into it.
I would counter that argument in that nobody is doing what you are saying. If they were then there would be more sites to download music. Yet where do most people buy their music? iTunes!!! So if your music ain't on iTunes it ain't anywhere...
No I think people are not looking...
In my original posting I said that there were good bands... BUT, and this is the big difference they are not coming to the foreground in popularity. What you may like is probably esoteric and I could argue horrible, but you like it and that is ok. What I am arguing about is pop music... Pop music was better...
What I am tired of is people who don't look at history, or read the freaken article. EJ is not saying that he hates the Internet because he is not making enough money. Elton John a few years ago said he quite recording. What Elton John is saying is that he is tired of the lack of creativity that the Internet is spawning. In fact on that level he is 100% right.
Let me compare this to something I am much more aware of visual art:
There have been many art movements: expressionism, surrealism, abstract, etc. Yet all of these movements predate 1950! Since the 60's there has been no major visual art movement in anything! It is a rehash of everything we have done in the past. If anything this era is predicated on taking the stuff already thought of and mixing it up. You could argue that, the act of mashing up art is a new art movement. Though I would agree with Elton John in that there is very little new ideas and thoughts coming up in art.
In music I have been watching the VH-1 classic music channel, and it is interesting: 50-60's rock, 70's hippies, 80's bad hair day, 90's all against the world, 2000's? Paris Hilton? Britany Spears? You have got to be kidding me. Yes there are good artists in 2000, but they are not gaining the traction that good artists used to get. It seems that the people are not interested in quality, but quantity, and that I feel is the problem Elton John is harping on.
He talked about getting rid of the Internet, would that be a bad idea? Considering that I make my money with the Internet I actually think it is a good idea. I grew up loving the outdoors since I grew up in cottage country (late 80's early 90's). Yes we had video games, and electronics, but it did not match up the excitement of windsurfing, fishing, ice skating, swimming, water skiing, etc. Yet how many kids do that these days? In Canada recently they discovered that young kids do move around quite a bit. It is once they reach the teens that they stop doing anything. Once teens becomes teens only 15% remain active. That has to scare you quite a bit. And what it implies is that teens don't use their brains anymore. They just consume, consume, consume... Creativity comes from having to exercise your brains and experiencing things that are not packaged in nice neat bundles.
So you see Elton John does have a point...
Wanna know why people are breaking traffic laws? BECAUSE THEY ARE DAMM STUPID when applied the way they are in North America.
1) Stop signs: Why must every corner have a stop sign? You drive five meters and oops another stop sign. Europe was smarter in that they actually use the YIELD sign! When was the last time the yield sign was used in North America?
2) Stop lights: North America if it is not in love with the stop sign happens, then becomes in love with the stop light. Ever heard of a round-about? Britain has quite a few, and now mainland Europe is building them everywhere because they are efficient at keeping traffic moving.
3) Speed Limit: In some corners of North America the speed limit is so freaken low it ain't even funny. In Europe depending on the country if you can drive faster they let you drive faster. The speed limit is fitted so that traffic can keep moving. And if traffic should slow down then well many cities have changing speed limits and traffic is slowed down.
Quotas: Absolutely police have quotas. If the police REALLY cared about stopping bad behavior then they would stop reckless driving. But of course that is harder to catch and requires being on guard and active. Yet speeding is easy. Sit in a corner and wait!
So while I don't blame the individual policeperson, I do blame the freaken system since it is so much out of whack.
I would add:
* Constructive: I looked at your code. Here is what is good. And here are the reasons why I am apprehensive about it. The problem that I have is that if I included the code there would be some serious ramifications namely XYZ.
Here is what most people cannot do. They cannot be constructive because using the arguments they proposed in the constructive it would imply that they would have to change their opinion. Thus people resort to "This code sucks."
Having written code and looked at code it is hard to have to change your opinion. We all too often fall into a trap, "this is how I did it and thus this is how everyone will do it." I suspect Linus feel into this trap because Con annoyed him personally....
Ok here is the context of open source.
1) You work for free...
2) You write the code that works the best
3) You hope that it is integrated.
It's not integrated and Linus calls you a bozo! Yeah I would be motivated to continue...
No this sounds like a geek clique where only those that think like the clique survive...
>Even though SD is somewhat better than CFS
Ah ok a solution is better... We use that solution, right? Because after all is that not what Open Source is all about? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meritocracy)
Meritocracy is a system of government or other organization based on demonstrated ability (merit) and talent rather than by wealth (plutocracy), family connections (nepotism), class privilege, cronyism, popularity (as in democracy) or other historical determinants of social position and political power.
>Ingo is orders of magnitude a better programmer than Con, orders of magnitude more knowledgeable, he gets paid to do the work, has gotten along with Linus for years, and will eventually make CFS as good as SD and even better.
Ok so demonstrated was a scheduler that was better, but chosen was somebody who is perceived as being more knowledgeable, and gets along with Linus and EVENTUALLY will make CFS as good or better... And until EVENTUALLY hits I should wait around and suffer the problems? And how is this different from say Microsoft who refuses to fix bugs?
Let's call this what it is! Corporatism at the open source level with Linus's nepotism!
I have no idea if you are being sarcastic or serious. Ok let's assume serious.
So what you are saying is that people are being self-interested and thus not paying for the software. And by contributing to a pot to further software it is being communist? Assuming that is what you are saying then I can only say, you have made the argument why Free software will not succeed.
Here is the problem, when something is free the amount of effort people will exert to help it along is minimal. Self-interest as you call it. If people have to pay for something then they will be careful about how they use and will complain if something went wrong. That complaint fosters bug fixes, updates, etc. When I have a problem with Open Source who do I call? The answer most Open Source people have, "you have the sources fix it." Oh yeah? Really? And if I post a question on the mailing lists that are newbie in nature what is the answer? Read the FAQ or the news groups.
Again the person who is lazy is being self-interested, and the person replying with buzz off is being self-interested. End result person does not want the hassle, lays out 100 USD for Windows and gets a system that can print, scan, without problems...
BTW Open Source works because people are not being self-interested. If you read many of the open source docs from the Free Software foundation they talk about the commons and how people should work together...
>But I view this as a drain on the rest of the economy.
Let's look at economics and ask is it a drain on the rest of society? Answer no, because from 1990 to say 1995 the software industry grew by bounds and leaps. The software economy is a real economy. For example do you consider it a drain that you have to pay for clothes, food, cars, houses, etc? No because you factor it in.
>Just think about how many web startups are using a LAMP stack... would their businesses be possible in a purely commercial software world?
Here is where I argue that you need to take a good close look at history. The web came into force say 1995-1997. Around this time there was no LAMP stack. The web server of choice was NCSA, and most of the web applications were run using PERL. PHP started around 1995, but did not catch on in a major way until say 1997, 1998. Around this time the web was already taking off in a major way.
The development stack was a hodge podge of tools and utilities, and it was costly because around this time SUN made billions selling extremely expensive servers to dot.com's. So if you say free software will dominate, then I would counter and say during the dot.com heyday companies that sold expensive hardware and services like Sun made oodles of money.
The LAMP stack did not get full attention until say 2000-2001 when the dot.com bubble was bursting, and people could not afford the Sun boxes or the expensive other services. With LAMP people could create software without paying a dime. So what came out of the web infrastructure since 2001? Actually not much. Web services, Ajax, HTTP 1.1, XML, what have you it was developed during the dotcom era. Since 2001 we have had adoption of the concepts developed pre-2001, which is good, but that does not build an ecosystem.
> because in the long term how can something be more attractive than free
Easy answer, when free does not do what you want it to. Let's be real about this, Windows costs around 100 USD per license. Does 100 USD really kill you? Maybe in developing countries, but developing countries have their own distributions. If for a 100 USD my computer can print, scan, play audio without any problems whatsoever then I would fork over the 100 USD because I don't feel like twiddling around. This is what Linux on the desktop promoters are missing. It is not just a matter of creating a stable and robust desktop, but to get a desktop that does what I want it to.
Linux had a window of opportunity before Vista was released. They squandered, and now that door is shut!
Until the release of Vista I used to be a very very big supporter of Linux and open source. I still use Linux on our servers, but for the desktop I have conceded defeat!
>Never heard of CP/M then?
You mean the guy who did not have the senses to think big volume? The guy who was too dumb to see a good thing when he had it?
>Oh please. The PC up until maybe 5-10 years ago was anything but innovative. The Amiga and Mac in the 80s were light years ahead of the PC in both hardware and software.
I have no idea how old you are, but having gone through the Vic20, Pet, and many other computers the PC did one thing that all of these other computers did not. They made the computer a commodity. It was truly amazing. The PC provided a platform for general purpose computing. It was not flashy, but it worked.
To illustrate how old I am, when I was using the Pet and C64 in high school the network was called Kermit and to write to a floppy over the Kermit network you had to literally yell, "Writing on disk." Otherwise two computers would overwrite each others work. The Vic, the Amiga, and Mac had flashy graphics, but they forced you to go down their route. Mac meant Mac hardware and at the time things were pricy! It's not like today where you can pick up a 250 GB harddisk for a couple of hundred bucks! At that time harddisks cost thousands of dollars...
Software? Ha! Dream on... Learned how to write your own basic code? No the PC was a revolution and innovative due to its shear simplicity...
Give the man a cigar!
I have gone through the Microsoft era, Unix era, Open Source era, Java era, and so on. YES I am a gray beard like the original grand parent poster. And if there is one thing that Microsoft has learned and keeps on propagating is that you can make money with Microsoft. This is not something to treat lightly.
I will give you another example; AutoCad. They are essentially the last standing CAD software. Yes there are others, but none as popular as AutoCad. Why? Well one reason is that you could copy it. BUT another bigger reason was that from day 1 AutoCad could be extended so that you could add value to AutoCad. AutoCad created an environment where people could prosper and thus secured their place in history.
Open Source did get one thing right in that they solved problems that people were having. Open Source did not focus on features. What Open Source got wrong is making money for people. The environment around Open Source is a cheapskate environment. Redhat offered Fedora because people stopped buying Redhat Linux. People did not buy software, and to this day still don't buy software. You have more people using for free than adding to the ecosystem, and that hurts!
Yes there are big companies using and supporting Linux. BUT add together the economies around Microsoft and I would not hesitate to use trillions of dollars. First you have Microsoft, then you have people selling software for Windows, then you have consultancies supporting Windows, then you have custom coders for Microsoft, then you have conferences, then you have trainers, etc, etc. It is an incredibly HUGE ecosystem that is profitable for everybody involved.
If you look at the latest incomes of the Open Source vendors it is down right disappointing after a decade of potential. For crying out loud Ubuntu is the result of a guy who made his money with something else and is supporting Ubuntu because he wants to have fun!
If Linux and Open Source REALLY want to beat Microsoft, then Open Source folks should STOP BEING DAMM CHEAPSKATES! I am sure everybody is capable of forking over 50 USD per year. If we use a conservative number of 1 million users world wide that would mean 50 million dollars income and that would mean a heck of a lot programmers could be hired to solve those darn user interface problems!
Do I buy and support software? Absolutely, as a matter of principle because I earn my money from software.
Having and still using three systems; OSX, Linux, and Windows I think Linux on the desktop is not going anywhere. Yes you can mod me down as flamebait, but I have waited for the longest time to get a usable Linux on the desktop. Linux for programming is fantastic. It does things how I expect it to be.
Though Linux on the desktop for "easy" jobs like mail its ok as well. But here are the issues I just keep running into.
1) Media is choppy. I keep having problems where I can't listen to multiple streams at once. Let's say I am watching a DVD, put it on pause and then want to listen to a podcast. I get audio device errors galore.
2) If I compile something heavy duty and then want to watch a DVD, no can do, even though I multi-core CPU. Windows? No problem I regularly run big simulations on one CPU, while watching a DVD at the same time.
3) Get me a decent word processor, and spreadsheet. NO Open Office is not it. AbiWord is actually pretty good for basic tasks, but fails for anything beyond that.
4) Get me a printer that actually works! I am not kidding on this one. I can't print documents for the life of me. Yes blame it on the printer companies, but the end result is that I can't print, and I am not about to write my own printer software.
5) Get me a scanner software that actually works well. I have this old Cannon scanner that I can't get to work for the life of me. Windows a snap.
6) SKYPE? That's a joke. Try watching a DVD, and speaking at the same time? Or compiling or speaking at the same time. For reasons that are beyond me SKYPE goes choppy at times so that I have use Windows.
The interesting thing is that quite a few of these peeves were touched upon by Con Kolivas, who complained that Linux on the Desktop is getting no love whatsoever. Even on OSX I have some of these problems. On Windows? No problem whatsoever. So why should I beat myself on the head with Linux? Linux on the server is great, don't get me wrong. But on the desktop? Forget about it...
How about Windows is easier to use?
Naaaa, couldn't be that!
You can debate, argue, point all one wants. BUT the reality of the matter is that people seem to continue buying Windows, year after year. Some of that may be lock in, but I doubt 100% of that is lock in. Thus when everything is done and said, maybe there might be a few million people who actually prefer Windows...
There is no difference in the RIAA/MPAA and the Free Software Foundation. You talk about fair use. If a company used fair use in their software would you find that acceptable? For example, let's say that Microsoft were to use parts of the scheduler in their Windows software. That could fall under fair use since the scheduler is a small piece in comparison to the everything else. How would you feel if companies do that?
After all when you use fair use you are not giving all of the money that the copyright license could earn.
My point has been since the Free Software Foundation dictates their terms using the copyright law, the RIAA/MPAA have the same right to dictate their terms. You might not agree with the RIAA/MPAA terms, and might agree with the FSF, but that is beside the point. The main argument is that if you support strong support of the GPL like the German courts did, then you have to support strong use by the RIAA/MPAA. Doing otherwise would be hypocritical.
Dude, I wish I had points to give you. You just nailed the topic, and oddly many don't seem to get it. I use both Windows, and Ubuntu and while Ubuntu is nice for developing it sucks for doing video or audio. For example say I am running a DVD, and then want to listen to a podcast. Not at the same time, but I stop the DVD, and listen to the podcast. I get an error, "Could not access device." This is completely bogus. I have to close my DVD app to listen to a podcast.
It is these little things that drive me bonkers on the desktop... Linux as a server is great, desktop... well... Con Kolivas ain't calling it end game for nothing...
>>You know, that company who has PC Manufacturers pay for Windows for each PC it sells, even if it runs Linux ... yeah, I know, they're not forcing this down their throat, it's just that if they don't comply they get to pay 3 times more.
So don't buy from those manufacturers! That is my point. If you don't like how Microsoft does things, then don't support the Microsoft infrastructure. Buy OSX, buy Linux, and don't use a single piece of Microsoft software. The kicker here is that people DON'T CARE... That's why Microsoft continues to make profit...