I have a hard time looking at MAPS vs. the spammers as us agsinst them anymore. For me this has turned into one of those moral dilemas wherein the actions taken by maps are nearly as deplorable as those they are attempting to defeat.
Do not misunderstand, I am no sympathizer of the spammers. I do not think what they do warrants first ammendmend protection. However, I do not think that MAPS arbitrarily black holing companies who it cannot strong arm with threats really deserves our respect anymore.
I wish we could make this point to every teenage kid who drops $40 on $BAND_OF_THE_WEEK.
I don't think you and I are the only people with this opinion. There's a guy in my office (I'm sure we all know one of these) who has more napster leeched MP3s than he really knows what to do with. He spends hours just trying to organize them into something that makes sense; then he spends more hours burning them onto CDs to play in his car.
So now he has dozens of CDs of MP3 ripped to WAV. They sound like shit and he thinks he has something at a bargain (yes, my time is worthless, how about yours?). I do not get it and neither do most of the other people who know him.
At the end of the day, the thing that puts me out the most about this whole RIAA war against the consumer is their premise:
YOU ARE A THEIF WHO WILL STEAL ANYTHING YOU CAN GET YOUR HANDS ON.
No, no I am not a thief, and neither are my friends and colleagues. We are the people who believe in value; the people who pay for our things. Clue: we are not the same folks ripping shit off of Napster and DivX-ing our favorite flicks off the eeenter-net. Do they really think those people would pay for things in the first place?
I like music and movies as most people do, but I don't buy CDs anymore and I don't buy DVDs very often.
What I do is I take that twenty bucks I would drop on a CD and I amble down the street to the local pub that has live music. I pay the $5 cover and have a beer or two with friends and I leave the rest of the cash to the band's tip jar.
I try to put my money where my mouth is. I would rather support local musicians playing stuff that's not always, "my thing" than drop another dime into the coffers of the RIAA.
"This is the best way to protect America's valuable creative works, which in turn will expand broadband access and Internet use,"
That's funny. Now, I could have sworn that the internet came to be the world-altering sucess it is today due to open standards and a lack of control. But hey, who knows, maybe I just need to go take my soma and follow the MPAA/RIAA party line? yeah.
You and I and probably 1/2 the readership of/. realize that mHz is the tachometer of a PC, not the speedometer. However, the rest of the world thinks it's the other way around.
You're speaking of the corporate volume customer, correct? Not the you and me and everybody else who just shops at Fry's customer?
If this is the case then yes, I fully agree that there are all kinds of dirty tricks behind closed doors. This is the nature of any competitive business; you offer your biggest customer the best value so they continue to be the biggest customer.
I like AMD as well, but I would still maintain that Intel makes an enormously larger margin per chip *on average* than AMD ever did.
But with the power glut that's become the norm of a 'household' PC and the general economic slow down of late, news like this strikes me as making sense...
However, the line about Intel "aggressively pricing" their P4's is just so much CNN tripe. A quick look at Sharkey's Extreme Weekly CPU prices shows this to be BS.
(hint: top of the line AMD - 100 bucks, Intel -- 500 bucks)
The arguement I read most is: IIS v. Apache / PHP. I have a small shop whose servers host HTTP, IMAP, SMTP, FTP and windows file sharing. More and more I come to the conclusion that there is very little reason to run a non-OSS server. I'm sure I'm not alone here. The problem being, most small shops (mine included) do not have the deapth in expertise to rehost everything to a non-windows server environment.
So, are there $YOUR_FAVORITE_OSS -related companies playing off this sentiment?
Most of the advertising I see from Red Hat and the like is "screw licensing" and not "we can help you replace costly windows servers." I think that's an important distinction to any business.
Are any of the linux companies activly promoting reviews such as this by offering to replace the *functionality* of IIS in corporate environs?
Just curious,
- RLJ
did you forward this ...
on
Handling the Loads
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
to CNN or MSNBC?
:-)
This is a great writeup. It covers all the things you could have done on your end to make/. fly. I guess the only prerequisite that most of us have trouble with are the Phat Pipes you folks can afford.
I see that as the given for updating hoards of WinNT boxen all the time "use a script."
Back in days of old when I was young and foolish I thought, "what can it hurt, I'll add the local users to the admin group on their boxes." Yes yes, if you've done it or seen somebody do you it you're laughing at me right now. That's fine. So the net became this big thing and everyone needed a browser on their desktop and email attachments were great and look at all the things people send me that I can double click!
Yeah, moral of story: Domain users are now part of the local "users" group on all my NT boxes. Oh, and NT really needs it's own version of su.
If Linux is so darned stable, why do you guys care?
yes, that was sarcasm
- RLJ
Re:What has Dmitry been up to?
on
Sklyarov Update
·
· Score: 1
You could print these and make some cash to help his defense. I'd buy one.
- RLJ
is there a schedule of planned protest?
on
Sklyarov Update
·
· Score: 2
Does anyone have a link to any planned picketing?
I am within driving distance of the court house and this is something I feel strongly enough about to take a day off work and make the 4 hour trip. It would be nice to coordinate my efforts with other like-minded individuals and present a unified front against this type of corporate harrasment against the rights of the individual.
Hmmm, let's think... how does "not very" sound? No, that doesn't quite capture the spirit of my initial question.
I'm looking for something that says, "How bad of a businessman do you have to be to finance your nearly-underwater company from your own not-so-deep pockets" that fits into a simple sound bite.
First off, thank you for not being a spelling nazi. Geez, I can't eat lunch and post to/. and proof read at the same time!:-)
"Distributed hypermedia method for automatically invoking external application providing interaction and display of embedded objects within a hypermedia document."
That's the text of the patent mentioned from Cringely's article. Depending on how one spins the definition of "hypermedia" document (ergo, why didn't they just say hypertext? or HTML / XML / SGML?) this thing has enormous implications. Many content-related applications (word processing, drafting, streaming media, etc.) today support different types of object embedding.
Consider MS Word, Macromedia Flash and say... AutoDesk AutoCAD; are they "hypermedia" documents? They can reference other unrelated works and they can include embedded objects that automatically launch other applications. I'm honestly not sure what constitutes hypermedia. However, I am certain that court rulings like this have solidified my opposition to all software patents.
I totally agree except for the assumption that the company producing the port pays shelf price for each version.
Wouldn't Loki have to be working deals with the publishers and their respective development houses from the get go? Wouldn't those deals revolve around the value Loki was adding by expanding market share and thereby give them leverage for a volume discounted price?
I know, I know, I'm replacing your assumption with two of my own. So there.:-)
-- RLJ
I think you are on the right track. I don't like to admit it either, but the line from the email pertaining to mistakes made by a young company just rings hallow. Typically it takes more than a few years for a company to 'mature' into something sensible, etc.
The 'real world' analogy for you and I and most people who do not own their own companies (all you folks who contract, no, that doesn't count) would be thus: how many people do you know who've had a vehicle repossessed and then been able to get a home loan?
So here's a reality check question: who is going to buy a company that starved in a market with NO competitors?
MS licenses Java from Sun so they can get into that eenter-net thing
MS changes java (you put your left leg in... )
MS is sued by Sun
MS is also sued by that little software joint that showed everybody what a good idea it was to embed code in a web browser (I'm still pretty sure it's NOT a good idea to embed code in a text document, but I digress).
MS looses on both counts
MS blames plantif in lawsuit #2 for it's actions in compliance with lawsuit #1 (slick move, slimy, but you gotta admire it just on pure sleeze factor).
My question is: when will microsoft be removing ActiveX support from IE?
I seem to remember this as well. C|Net's Gamecenter (who are they now? Damn consolidation...) used to run a "Worst Of" for the year's worst games. If you got in early you could nominate games as the worst and then vote on them.
What a great concept, I bet the internet would be perfect for that... oh wait.
That is not a catch-22. There's no inherent paradox because there's no incentive to give a bad review (unless journalistic integrity counts, but these game web sites aren't run by journalists anyway.)
Regarding your latter point, let's agree to disagree on the definition of 'journalist' rather than play semantics. I think a lot of the hardware related websites blur the lines between hobbiest / professional. Either way, I can respect your opinion that those folks are not journalists, I just disagree.
So far as incentive to write a bad reviews is concerned, I see things differently. I believe the incentive to write a bad review would be that the author, as a hardware enthusiast, respects the work (s)he does in evaluating a product and when it sucks, they want to be able to say, "it sucks" without being blackballed by nVidia or ATI or Eidos or...
Perhaps I am being a bit of a conspiracy nut, but it strikes me as very simple for a marketing exec at Big Hardware Company to do a search through Bluesnews.com's archive for "MyVideoChip Review" over the past 8 months. Pick out the bad ones and add them to the "no more Christmas Presents" list.
Slashdot Mirror
Do not misunderstand, I am no sympathizer of the spammers. I do not think what they do warrants first ammendmend protection. However, I do not think that MAPS arbitrarily black holing companies who it cannot strong arm with threats really deserves our respect anymore.
A good idea gone awry.
Cheers,
- RLJ
I don't think you and I are the only people with this opinion. There's a guy in my office (I'm sure we all know one of these) who has more napster leeched MP3s than he really knows what to do with. He spends hours just trying to organize them into something that makes sense; then he spends more hours burning them onto CDs to play in his car.
So now he has dozens of CDs of MP3 ripped to WAV. They sound like shit and he thinks he has something at a bargain (yes, my time is worthless, how about yours?). I do not get it and neither do most of the other people who know him.
At the end of the day, the thing that puts me out the most about this whole RIAA war against the consumer is their premise:
YOU ARE A THEIF WHO WILL STEAL ANYTHING YOU CAN GET YOUR HANDS ON.
No, no I am not a thief, and neither are my friends and colleagues. We are the people who believe in value; the people who pay for our things. Clue: we are not the same folks ripping shit off of Napster and DivX-ing our favorite flicks off the eeenter-net. Do they really think those people would pay for things in the first place?
Thanks for your thoughts,
- RLJ
I like music and movies as most people do, but I don't buy CDs anymore and I don't buy DVDs very often.
What I do is I take that twenty bucks I would drop on a CD and I amble down the street to the local pub that has live music. I pay the $5 cover and have a beer or two with friends and I leave the rest of the cash to the band's tip jar.
I try to put my money where my mouth is. I would rather support local musicians playing stuff that's not always, "my thing" than drop another dime into the coffers of the RIAA.
- Cheers,
- RLJ
That's funny. Now, I could have sworn that the internet came to be the world-altering sucess it is today due to open standards and a lack of control. But hey, who knows, maybe I just need to go take my soma and follow the MPAA/RIAA party line? yeah.
- Cheers,
- RLJ
You and I and probably 1/2 the readership of /. realize that mHz is the tachometer of a PC, not the speedometer. However, the rest of the world thinks it's the other way around.
Bummer for AMD, eh?
- RLJ
If this is the case then yes, I fully agree that there are all kinds of dirty tricks behind closed doors. This is the nature of any competitive business; you offer your biggest customer the best value so they continue to be the biggest customer.
I like AMD as well, but I would still maintain that Intel makes an enormously larger margin per chip *on average* than AMD ever did.
Cheers,
- RLJ
-RLJ
- rlj
However, the line about Intel "aggressively pricing" their P4's is just so much CNN tripe. A quick look at Sharkey's Extreme Weekly CPU prices shows this to be BS.
(hint: top of the line AMD - 100 bucks, Intel -- 500 bucks)
- Cheers
- RLJ
The arguement I read most is: IIS v. Apache / PHP. I have a small shop whose servers host HTTP, IMAP, SMTP, FTP and windows file sharing. More and more I come to the conclusion that there is very little reason to run a non-OSS server. I'm sure I'm not alone here. The problem being, most small shops (mine included) do not have the deapth in expertise to rehost everything to a non-windows server environment.
So, are there $YOUR_FAVORITE_OSS -related companies playing off this sentiment?
Most of the advertising I see from Red Hat and the like is "screw licensing" and not "we can help you replace costly windows servers." I think that's an important distinction to any business.
- Cheers,
- RLJ
Just curious,
- RLJ
This is a great writeup. It covers all the things you could have done on your end to make /. fly. I guess the only prerequisite that most of us have trouble with are the Phat Pipes you folks can afford.
Cheers,
- RLJ
I see that as the given for updating hoards of WinNT boxen all the time "use a script."
Back in days of old when I was young and foolish I thought, "what can it hurt, I'll add the local users to the admin group on their boxes." Yes yes, if you've done it or seen somebody do you it you're laughing at me right now. That's fine. So the net became this big thing and everyone needed a browser on their desktop and email attachments were great and look at all the things people send me that I can double click!
Yeah, moral of story: Domain users are now part of the local "users" group on all my NT boxes. Oh, and NT really needs it's own version of su.
Cheers, - RLJ
If Linux is so darned stable, why do you guys care?
yes, that was sarcasm
- RLJ
- RLJ
I am within driving distance of the court house and this is something I feel strongly enough about to take a day off work and make the 4 hour trip. It would be nice to coordinate my efforts with other like-minded individuals and present a unified front against this type of corporate harrasment against the rights of the individual.
Anyone with information, it would be appreciated.
Thank you,
-- RLJ
I really took a pee in your Cheerios, didn't I?
See ya,
-- RLJ
Good write up.
/me: bookmarks for PHBs of the world in need of history lesson.
Am I the only one reminded of the PBS 'Revenge of the Nerds' history of silly valley? I think it was PBS that did it; came out a couple years ago.
Regardless, I think I'll go whack myself on the head with a big rock.
-- RLJ
I'm looking for something that says, "How bad of a businessman do you have to be to finance your nearly-underwater company from your own not-so-deep pockets" that fits into a simple sound bite.
Cheers,
-- RLJ
That's the text of the patent mentioned from Cringely's article. Depending on how one spins the definition of "hypermedia" document (ergo, why didn't they just say hypertext? or HTML / XML / SGML?) this thing has enormous implications. Many content-related applications (word processing, drafting, streaming media, etc.) today support different types of object embedding.
Consider MS Word, Macromedia Flash and say ... AutoDesk AutoCAD; are they "hypermedia" documents? They can reference other unrelated works and they can include embedded objects that automatically launch other applications. I'm honestly not sure what constitutes hypermedia. However, I am certain that court rulings like this have solidified my opposition to all software patents.
Thanks for your thoughts,
-- RLJ
Wouldn't Loki have to be working deals with the publishers and their respective development houses from the get go? Wouldn't those deals revolve around the value Loki was adding by expanding market share and thereby give them leverage for a volume discounted price?
I know, I know, I'm replacing your assumption with two of my own. So there. :-)
-- RLJ
The 'real world' analogy for you and I and most people who do not own their own companies (all you folks who contract, no, that doesn't count) would be thus: how many people do you know who've had a vehicle repossessed and then been able to get a home loan?
So here's a reality check question: who is going to buy a company that starved in a market with NO competitors?
Anyone ... anyone?
-- RLJ
My question is: when will microsoft be removing ActiveX support from IE?
Thank you, have a nice day,
-- RLJ
What a great concept, I bet the internet would be perfect for that ... oh wait.
Cheers,
- RLJ
Regarding your latter point, let's agree to disagree on the definition of 'journalist' rather than play semantics. I think a lot of the hardware related websites blur the lines between hobbiest / professional. Either way, I can respect your opinion that those folks are not journalists, I just disagree.
So far as incentive to write a bad reviews is concerned, I see things differently. I believe the incentive to write a bad review would be that the author, as a hardware enthusiast, respects the work (s)he does in evaluating a product and when it sucks, they want to be able to say, "it sucks" without being blackballed by nVidia or ATI or Eidos or ...
Perhaps I am being a bit of a conspiracy nut, but it strikes me as very simple for a marketing exec at Big Hardware Company to do a search through Bluesnews.com's archive for "MyVideoChip Review" over the past 8 months. Pick out the bad ones and add them to the "no more Christmas Presents" list.
Thanks for your thoughts,
RLJ