Which is basically the same model - lots of different parallel approaches to the same problem, and the best one, or group, wins.
Closed source companies cannot do this, they operate in a constant state of limited resources. We can. We should consider it a strength and play to it.
Sure, it get's acrimonious, but this is a symptom of fiercely-fought ideas. If someone feels that passionately about something, they ought to be able to convince others, or they are being blinkered - if they're blinkered, they'll wither and die. If they persuade the rest, they'll move to the next stage. Where's the problem, apart from bruised ego's ? Nature is red in blood and claw. We're slightly more civilised than that already:-)
For the last few hundred years, commerce has been the driving goal behind human development, barring the occasional major war... The reasons are based in the costs of production, dissemination, and utilisation of knowledge and materials, versus the potential profit of using that information.
One new factor is communication, which has advanced to the level where no great expense is required for long-distance communications. Merchant princes rose and fell by their application of knowledge that others didn't have, today we have near-as-dammit instant communication with negligible costs. We pay people in other countries, and have a truly global market.
There is another new factor coming into play: zero- (or at least, minimal) cost goods.Until recently, manufacturing costs were per-copy of an object, now we deal in abstract knowledge more often, recreating the object we desire locally. This obviously doesn't apply to real physical objects, but how often do we download models, music, video, programs, and data. There is negligible duplication costs involved here, so costs can be amortised over the whole collection, and are far less per item.
Perhaps we can see forward to a future where digital assets have limited protection; the competitive advantage of being first compensating for the lower barrier-to-entry for companies. The first steps towards a truly creative commons, open to all without restriction. If such a thing were ever to become reality, the GPL or a similar (not-for-profit-without-forking-out-dosh) licence would be ideal. In that case, I think we'd all be significantly more grateful to RMS than we are today...
Or perhaps not. (And I leave the reader to decide which point I refer to with 'not':-)
... was my favourite. A *really* well designed OS on a 1MHz machine, with the basic having simple interfaces to the OS routines and the built-in assembler. Absolutely fantastic machine for its day, and this book laid it all bare.
[grin] I remember using that and the network guide to load up *SAY across the network ont remote computers at college:-) Students (who really weren't that computer-savvy back then) would freak out if their computer started to "talk" to them...
Still, it is made out of a cheap'n'cheerful plastic. You could have a "sugar-cube" like holder for the device, and just pop a new one in when it has filled up.
Also, if it's random access and read-only, then you could have a bit somewhere in a "sector" that said 'this has been deleted', so you don't end up with enormous directories, but the data is still all there waiting for that necessary 'restore'....
but it's as valid today as it ever was. There is a dichotomy between security and ease-of-use. Hitherto it has been impossible to have the one and the other simultaneously. Choose one.
Apple choose ease-of-use, and get criticised for leaving an open security "hole". Microsoft choose the same, and get criticised for (well, just about everything except wonderful marketing), and Linux chooses the other, and is criticised for poor ease-of-use.
That's not to say it's impossible, but it needs more than the current level of effort that goes into multi-node design. Apple is taking the first steps, and they've been somewhat burnt. Let's hope that doesn't discourage them from carrying on down the path... Unix as a genre can only learn from a successful easy-to-use and secure implementation of multi-machine computing. The thing is that you only learn by trying....
He argues both that DRM is a concept not a technology, and that the overall costs and balances of DRM ought to be taken into account (the Cable TV argument), and that the financial value of art is in its ability to draw a crowd.
The cost of applying DRM to a given work should be factored (as a negative) into the popularity and therefore take-up of that work. I'm still not convinced that anyone "high up" in the content-protection (**IA) business has figured that out... This ought to be required reading for industry execs.
It was 1984, not 1986. Read the history.... It wasn't digital, it was analogue (laserdisk is an analogue medium). The designers wrote it in a cross-platform way, that's all a designer can do - if it doesn't end up being ported to all and sundry, well, shucks. Maybe next time.
Oh yeah - I feel no particular need to abuse you just because you're wrong. Manners maketh man. I'm neither stupid nor of african descent, the 'sack of shit' is biologically pretty accurate, but then it is for all the human race...
And I never resort to being an 'Anonymous coward'. I have the good grace and moral fibre to stand by my opinions.
.. to immersive games. I'd guess the next ones up will be commando (doom) like, but that's probably a ways away. You'll need force feedback for the rail gun:-)
I guess if AOL take a note of the hardware ethernet address (not surprising, because DSL lines aren't supposed to be shared, right:-) then just doing a query for the address on AOL's db would be enough to get a (very) shortlist...
"[grin] It sort of guesses wrong on purpose if it doesn't know - my theory is that people are more likely to correct it if it's wildly wrong than slightly wrong:-)"
If you want to mail me a list of those monitored IP addresses, I'd much appreciate it - I'll add the lot:-)
I tried to integrate the bogons list (unroutable networks) to speed up the auto-mapping of IP addresses using the regex rules. Unfortunately the bogons list I got was out of date, or incorrect, and included some real IP addresses. Guess yours was one:-( The upshot is that I lost about 700 IP address mappings from my 8000 or so that I had, before I realised the mistake and frantically hit CTRL-C...
Sorry about that - I've limited the bogons to the RFC1918 addresses for now, and I've started backing up the DB nightly not weekly, so should be able to recover better if another disaster strikes. I've also started logging all the access to a file outside the DB... Paranoid ? Perhaps...
I don't really mind what people use, so long as it makes sense.
I now have some 15000 or so place-names in Belgium (not in the public DB:-) which ought to cope with whatever people type in. If it's not recognised, the system will then try a soundex match on the name, and present a list, or ask for a new name. Only the recognised names will then get through (which will help with the dupes as well:-) This isn't ready yet, but it will be soon...
As for dynamic IP's, well obviously I can't. I can flag up when people use an IP range for more than one city, and mark it as dynamic, but over in the UK, the infrastructure is ATM, and geography plays no part in even static/29's over (eg) ADSL...
For the time being I just report back whatever was last input. I'll come up with something better once other problems are sorted out (mapping, peers, etc.)
Yeah, I'm working on it. One of the problems of free-text entry is that people often re-type-in a city name....
I've got a big list of cities now, so I should be able to make the 'type-in' thing mail me to add it, rather than just trust the name. If I spell that out, perhaps people will look a little more carefully for their name.
A bit of de-duping is certainly in order, though:-)
[grin] It sort of guesses wrong on purpose if it doesn't know - my theory is that people are more likely to correct it if it's wildly wrong than slightly wrong:-)
I'm working on the lat/long stuff this weekend, then there's a bunch of networks that can be automatically located. With this map of the net, I can start intelligently looking at IP's as well, rather than probing random ones that might not exist:-)
The IP map I'm (slowly) making will locate you to a city, eventually. It's only been going for about 15 days atm, but we're already up at ~15-20% successful at locating cities, according to visitors:-)
I doubt that locating to city has any privacy implications, and I'm only doing it to/24 for the time being, although with DSL companies giving static/29's I'll probably adapt to that soon enough...
Slashdot Mirror
Which is basically the same model - lots of different parallel approaches to the same problem, and the best one, or group, wins.
:-)
Closed source companies cannot do this, they operate in a constant state of limited resources. We can. We should consider it a strength and play to it.
Sure, it get's acrimonious, but this is a symptom of fiercely-fought ideas. If someone feels that passionately about something, they ought to be able to convince others, or they are being blinkered - if they're blinkered, they'll wither and die. If they persuade the rest, they'll move to the next stage. Where's the problem, apart from bruised ego's ? Nature is red in blood and claw. We're slightly more civilised than that already
Simon
For the last few hundred years, commerce has been the driving goal behind human development, barring the occasional major war... The reasons are based in the costs of production, dissemination, and utilisation of knowledge and materials, versus the potential profit of using that information.
:-)
One new factor is communication, which has advanced to the level where no great expense is required for long-distance communications. Merchant princes rose and fell by their application of knowledge that others didn't have, today we have near-as-dammit instant communication with negligible costs. We pay people in other countries, and have a truly global market.
There is another new factor coming into play: zero- (or at least, minimal) cost goods.Until recently, manufacturing costs were per-copy of an object, now we deal in abstract knowledge more often, recreating the object we desire locally. This obviously doesn't apply to real physical objects, but how often do we download models, music, video, programs, and data. There is negligible duplication costs involved here, so costs can be amortised over the whole collection, and are far less per item.
Perhaps we can see forward to a future where digital assets have limited protection; the competitive advantage of being first compensating for the lower barrier-to-entry for companies. The first steps towards a truly creative commons, open to all without restriction. If such a thing were ever to become reality, the GPL or a similar (not-for-profit-without-forking-out-dosh) licence would be ideal. In that case, I think we'd all be significantly more grateful to RMS than we are today...
Or perhaps not. (And I leave the reader to decide which point I refer to with 'not'
Simon
I knew someone would pick me up over that - I realised once I'd written it, but /. doesn't allow edits :-(
Simon.
... was my favourite. A *really* well designed OS on a 1MHz machine, with the basic having simple interfaces to the OS routines and the built-in assembler. Absolutely fantastic machine for its day, and this book laid it all bare.
:-) Students (who really weren't that computer-savvy back then) would freak out if their computer started to "talk" to them...
[grin] I remember using that and the network guide to load up *SAY across the network ont remote computers at college
Simon.
Still, it is made out of a cheap'n'cheerful plastic. You could have a "sugar-cube" like holder for the device, and just pop a new one in when it has filled up.
Also, if it's random access and read-only, then you could have a bit somewhere in a "sector" that said 'this has been deleted', so you don't end up with enormous directories, but the data is still all there waiting for that necessary 'restore'....
Simon
... all I need to do is invent the light-sabre, and I'll be essentially invulnerable, 'cos not one of them will be able to hit me :-) Cool :-)
Oh yeah, and become a jedi. Damn.
Simon
but it's as valid today as it ever was. There is a dichotomy between security and ease-of-use. Hitherto it has been impossible to have the one and the other simultaneously. Choose one.
Apple choose ease-of-use, and get criticised for leaving an open security "hole". Microsoft choose the same, and get criticised for (well, just about everything except wonderful marketing), and Linux chooses the other, and is criticised for poor ease-of-use.
That's not to say it's impossible, but it needs more than the current level of effort that goes into multi-node design. Apple is taking the first steps, and they've been somewhat burnt. Let's hope that doesn't discourage them from carrying on down the path... Unix as a genre can only learn from a successful easy-to-use and secure implementation of multi-machine computing. The thing is that you only learn by trying....
Simon.
He argues both that DRM is a concept not a technology, and that the overall costs and balances of DRM ought to be taken into account (the Cable TV argument), and that the financial value of art is in its ability to draw a crowd.
The cost of applying DRM to a given work should be factored (as a negative) into the popularity and therefore take-up of that work. I'm still not convinced that anyone "high up" in the content-protection (**IA) business has figured that out... This ought to be required reading for industry execs.
Simon
Dear dear, I did touch a nerve, didn't I.
.... It wasn't digital, it was analogue (laserdisk is an analogue medium). The designers wrote it in a cross-platform way, that's all a designer can do - if it doesn't end up being ported to all and sundry, well, shucks. Maybe next time.
It was 1984, not 1986. Read the history
Oh yeah - I feel no particular need to abuse you just because you're wrong. Manners maketh man. I'm neither stupid nor of african descent, the 'sack of shit' is biologically pretty accurate, but then it is for all the human race...
And I never resort to being an 'Anonymous coward'. I have the good grace and moral fibre to stand by my opinions.
Simon.
.. to immersive games. I'd guess the next ones up will be commando (doom) like, but that's probably a ways away. You'll need force feedback for the rail gun :-)
Simon
Hope he stays above the clouds :-)
Simon
.. so I too can view movies in colour when I'm browsing with Lynx :)
Simon
I guess if AOL take a note of the hardware ethernet address (not surprising, because DSL lines aren't supposed to be shared, right :-) then just doing a query for the address on AOL's db would be enough to get a (very) shortlist...
Simon.
All of a sudden I *don't* want to be classed as an ISP any more (re: that story
Simon.
As I said in another thread...
:-)"
:-)
"[grin] It sort of guesses wrong on purpose if it doesn't know - my theory is that people are more likely to correct it if it's wildly wrong than slightly wrong
If you want to mail me a list of those monitored IP addresses, I'd much appreciate it - I'll add the lot
ATB,
Simon
[grin] I'd love to take the credit, but if it was a guess, it's purely a fluke...
Simon.
"would it be feasible to allow GPS coords for those tech savvy ppl in the know."
:-)
:-)
Great idea
I'll add it to the list of things to change (hopefully) at the weekend
Cheers,
Simon
Hi,
:-( The upshot is that I lost about 700 IP address mappings from my 8000 or so that I had, before I realised the mistake and frantically hit CTRL-C...
I tried to integrate the bogons list (unroutable networks) to speed up the auto-mapping of IP addresses using the regex rules. Unfortunately the bogons list I got was out of date, or incorrect, and included some real IP addresses. Guess yours was one
Sorry about that - I've limited the bogons to the RFC1918 addresses for now, and I've started backing up the DB nightly not weekly, so should be able to recover better if another disaster strikes. I've also started logging all the access to a file outside the DB... Paranoid ? Perhaps...
Simon.
I don't really mind what people use, so long as it makes sense.
:-) which ought to cope with whatever people type in. If it's not recognised, the system will then try a soundex match on the name, and present a list, or ask for a new name. Only the recognised names will then get through (which will help with the dupes as well :-) This isn't ready yet, but it will be soon...
/29's over (eg) ADSL ...
I now have some 15000 or so place-names in Belgium (not in the public DB
As for dynamic IP's, well obviously I can't. I can flag up when people use an IP range for more than one city, and mark it as dynamic, but over in the UK, the infrastructure is ATM, and geography plays no part in even static
For the time being I just report back whatever was last input. I'll come up with something better once other problems are sorted out (mapping, peers, etc.)
Simon
Yeah, I'm working on it. One of the problems of free-text entry is that people often re-type-in a city name....
:-)
I've got a big list of cities now, so I should be able to make the 'type-in' thing mail me to add it, rather than just trust the name. If I spell that out, perhaps people will look a little more carefully for their name.
A bit of de-duping is certainly in order, though
Simon
[grin] It sort of guesses wrong on purpose if it doesn't know - my theory is that people are more likely to correct it if it's wildly wrong than slightly wrong :-)
:-)
:-))
I'm working on the lat/long stuff this weekend, then there's a bunch of networks that can be automatically located. With this map of the net, I can start intelligently looking at IP's as well, rather than probing random ones that might not exist
Tx for the correction
Simon
I'll certainly be taking a snapshot of it :-)
Simon
The IP map I'm (slowly) making will locate you to a city, eventually. It's only been going for about 15 days atm, but we're already up at ~15-20% successful at locating cities, according to visitors :-)
/24 for the time being, although with DSL companies giving static /29's I'll probably adapt to that soon enough...
I doubt that locating to city has any privacy implications, and I'm only doing it to
Simon
... I'll be starting to produce maps of IP addresses to latitude/longitude by IP address soon... Been sourcing the data.(See the sig.)
Simon
Whereas I'm all for more linux distro's, I'm not convinced that it's a /. item.. maybe a freshmeat announcement.
:-)
On the other hand, well done boys, you've just got a whole load more exposure - hope your server is up to it
Simon