99 Death Balloons Floating 'round my living room It would be quite the conversation piece If my friends weren't all blown to pieces No they're not just any gas bladder Can't you see they're Death Balloons?
As it happens I submited the story about that Zeppelin to Slashdot a bit over a year ago when they first began commercial flights and we all had an evening of fun making Hindenberg jokes.
The company is alive, well, and making commercial passenger sightseeing flights. If you want to take a zeppelin ride all you have to do is go to Lake Constance with 190 euros to spare in your pocket.
Whether or not they are even a database by the definition of the law would be a good debate, however, in this case, Project Gutenberg makes the entire base freely available, en masse, thus no misappropriation is possible.
If you cannot download for some reason, the project will even endeavor to mail it to you, 9400 works on a DVD, entirely free of charge.
I, for one, bless them for continuing to distribute in plain text. That's how I read and print them. On any machine capable of displaying plain text. My old 486 laptop, which I use as a text editor/ebook reader running Mu Linux doesn't even have a web browser installed. Not even Lynx. I don't need it.
However, that said, Project Gutenberg does distribute many texts in HTML format, which you can either download or read online. HTML is a plain text format, with plain text tags.
They do not distribute texts in propriatary formats.
Project Gutenberg texts are all in the public domain and the files are created by volunteers. There is no way to protect anyone's labor or philosophy. The material is free as in free.
The only "license scheme" is a protection of the Project Gutenberg trademark. If you wish to distribute the files and claim them as Project Gutenberg files you must distribute them unmodified, including the license text.
Since the files are all in the public domain anyone can download them and sell them, either as a computer file, a pdf, or a printed book. Or start a "competing" website with them.
Many already do this, and if people who have donated their time to the project don't understand that public domain allows this, well, I really don't know what to say.
They are in the Public Domain, not GPLed, or BSDed or whatever.
Project Gutenberg continues unabated. Simply go there for all your ASCII format, literary goodness.
No, I think it's a perfect word. Like customer. Serve your customers. That's what it's all about. It may not have an aristocratic air about it, but capitalism isn't about aristocracy. It's anti-aristocracy. It's about service, not rule.
We are, almost all of us, in some way "in service," just like a "house girl." Our task is to perform tasks for others. For pay.
"Providing solutions" for "consumers" or "Enterprise" is marketing doublespeak.
When my sweetie throws things they seem to take on an almost quantum quality. They can end up anywhere in the universe, irrespective of her original aim.
How many computer geeks bought Deer Hunter, or Dirt Track Racing? For that matter how many computer geeks bought Mandrake's The Sims distro?
Linux is already reasonably well supported in FPSs, because that's where sales to geeks are strongest, but the titles that sell millions of copies, on the whole, are not the games the geeks are playing.
I think there are some vaguely popular titles that would do well with a Linux geek version. Hard core sims, like IL2, maybe even NASCAR Season 2003 (despite the title. It's state of the art as a racing sim and has now been modded to modern Trans Am). There are some niche markets where the geek appeal ought to be significant, such as Battlefront's hard core war gaming products, and their games based on the old Avalon Hill style of board game really shouldn't be that hard to port.
But the games that sell in the millions, like the EA stuff, just doesn't have enough raw geek appeal to make the geek market significant.
From 1950 to 1975 was significant, and I remember most of it.
From 1980 to now has been the most technologically boring period since Newton. There has been some evolution, but other than personal computers and the internet it's mostly an evolution of mature technologies. My stereo is 25 years old and there's no reason to replace it. If I took you for a ride blindfolded in a 1980 car and a new car you couldn't tell which was which.
While in some repects, being a technologist, I have much higher tech around my house than most, I live much lower tech than the average janitor, and yet, walking through my house, a good deal of the technology, even that in my bicycle, didn't really exist 100+ years ago.
All of it existed 25 years ago, although perhaps in nascent form, like the net, which I first bumped into circa 1976.
The 80s sucked. They've kept on sucking and we live in their vacuum.
In the old days it used to be hard to get small businesses to expose themselves to the net at all. They were paranoid about running so much as a webserver for simple customer services.
Nowadays it's getting tough to convince them they need to keep a computer offline to protect sensitive core business data, even if it means a bit of sneaker netting now and again.
Perhaps times will change again as they swing back to paranoid.
Real men may upload their data to ftp and let everyone else mirror it. Smart men pull the ethernet cord. If nothing else you don't want the IRS/SEC to be able to pull your data off of someone else's server. You can't wipe what you don't have sole possession of.
The quick honest answer is that you can't, and even lawyers depend upon other lawyers to defend themselves.
You can acquire a certain facility with the law, in some cases of specific law even a superiour facility than the legal general practitioner. This will allow you, at least, to do a reasonable job of arranging settlements and plea bargains, although not generally quite as good as you could obtain with a lawyer.
If only because the lawyer has a professional acquaintence with the judge and DA. They have a way of doing business with each other. You're just some scmuck.
But where even a mediocre lawyer is going to kill you, even in those circumstances where you know law and logic to a greater degree than the lawyer, is in purely procedural matters. The pure mechanics of moving a case through the courts. It's second nature to him, done without thought. It's terra incognito to you.
Just as a physicist may know more about mechanics than an engineer, but a civil engineer is more likely to build a sounder bridge.
Your only real defense is in that most cases are petty. They cost no more to capitulate to than to sucessfully defend against.
Spend what little money you have for lawyers up front, in drafting your contracts and business procedures. Become well acquaited with whatever boilerplate you might use. Use the law prophylatically and you have a better chance when representing yourself in court.
And when all else fails there's little you can do other than taking your losses with a benign resignation to fate. Don't take the failure personally. It isn't a moral issue. Pay the judgement, pick up the pieces and get on with your life, knowing that it would have likely cost as much to "win" anyway.
This sounds like a company that's gone parasitic on FUD.
Nothing sells better. Just watch TV ads for a while, or walk down the isles of a supermarket, particularly the drug/personal care isles.
It's all sold by sex and fear, and fear of not getting sex. The heartbreak of psoriasis. The social outcasting of dandruff. The horror of your whites not being white enough.
What will the neighbors think?
Most people live by FUD while pursuing their lives of quiet desperation, and most companies at least parasitically prey on that fear. Some of them subsist on it entirely, even going so far as to create fears, through marketing campaigns, that had never previously existed, and which their product "solves."
In reality you'll always find some clever lawyer or easily-swayed jury that rules the other way.
Without even going that far, the act of being sued can be devastating, even if you just fight for a year and then they back off and it never really goes to trial.
Let's say a hundred bucks or so every time your lawyer picks up the phone. Several hundred for a letter. A grand for a simple motion. A couple months of just futzin' around and the legal bills can add up in a hurry.
I know of a judge who treats every petty charge as if it were a federal case. Really comes down hard on everyone, right down to a simple parking violation. And yet if you look at his conviction records they're no different than average.
When asked what gives he said, " I make them have to get a lawyer. Now that is punishment."
It isn't usually losing a suit that hurts. It's simply being involved in one. You have to get a lawyer. And anyone can sue you over damned near anything.
Slashdot Mirror
Would they wave their backdoors at us?
KFG
When correctly viewed, everything is lewd, however--Sometimes a blimp is just a blimp.
KFG
99 Death Balloons
Floating 'round my living room
It would be quite the conversation piece
If my friends weren't all blown to pieces
No they're not just any gas bladder
Can't you see they're Death Balloons?
With apologies to Nena and Tim.
KFG
As it happens I submited the story about that Zeppelin to Slashdot a bit over a year ago when they first began commercial flights and we all had an evening of fun making Hindenberg jokes.
The company is alive, well, and making commercial passenger sightseeing flights. If you want to take a zeppelin ride all you have to do is go to Lake Constance with 190 euros to spare in your pocket.
We be rigid gasbags and shit
KFG
Whether or not they are even a database by the definition of the law would be a good debate, however, in this case, Project Gutenberg makes the entire base freely available, en masse, thus no misappropriation is possible.
If you cannot download for some reason, the project will even endeavor to mail it to you, 9400 works on a DVD, entirely free of charge.
KFG
I, for one, bless them for continuing to distribute in plain text. That's how I read and print them. On any machine capable of displaying plain text. My old 486 laptop, which I use as a text editor/ebook reader running Mu Linux doesn't even have a web browser installed. Not even Lynx. I don't need it.
However, that said, Project Gutenberg does distribute many texts in HTML format, which you can either download or read online. HTML is a plain text format, with plain text tags.
They do not distribute texts in propriatary formats.
KFG
Project Gutenberg texts are all in the public domain and the files are created by volunteers. There is no way to protect anyone's labor or philosophy. The material is free as in free.
The only "license scheme" is a protection of the Project Gutenberg trademark. If you wish to distribute the files and claim them as Project Gutenberg files you must distribute them unmodified, including the license text.
Since the files are all in the public domain anyone can download them and sell them, either as a computer file, a pdf, or a printed book. Or start a "competing" website with them.
Many already do this, and if people who have donated their time to the project don't understand that public domain allows this, well, I really don't know what to say.
They are in the Public Domain, not GPLed, or BSDed or whatever.
Project Gutenberg continues unabated. Simply go there for all your ASCII format, literary goodness.
KFG
Clippy is nobody's friend, Skipper.
KFG
You rarely see an engineer with a slide rule anymore.
...reminding you that the first place you saw Capitalization used for Emphasis was a Milner work.
Although we still exist.
and the first place i saw a complete lack of it was in an e.e. cummings work.
KFG
It is also true that many people who work on free software, and an increasing number every day, are just plain silly.
KFG
okay, maybe "service" is a bad word. . .
No, I think it's a perfect word. Like customer. Serve your customers. That's what it's all about. It may not have an aristocratic air about it, but capitalism isn't about aristocracy. It's anti-aristocracy. It's about service, not rule.
We are, almost all of us, in some way "in service," just like a "house girl." Our task is to perform tasks for others. For pay.
"Providing solutions" for "consumers" or "Enterprise" is marketing doublespeak.
Got a problem? Perhaps I can be of service.
KFG
And primarily because we tend to focus on the function of the software, not on market value.
Most of the makers of these poor products could just as well be selling patent medicine.
In fact, in software terms, they are.
KFG
. . .biplanes with laser guns. . .
Sharks. Sharks with frickin' laser beams on their heads would be nice.
KFG
When my sweetie throws things they seem to take on an almost quantum quality. They can end up anywhere in the universe, irrespective of her original aim.
She can make SQL dance though.
KFG
How many computer geeks bought Deer Hunter, or Dirt Track Racing? For that matter how many computer geeks bought Mandrake's The Sims distro?
Linux is already reasonably well supported in FPSs, because that's where sales to geeks are strongest, but the titles that sell millions of copies, on the whole, are not the games the geeks are playing.
I think there are some vaguely popular titles that would do well with a Linux geek version. Hard core sims, like IL2, maybe even NASCAR Season 2003 (despite the title. It's state of the art as a racing sim and has now been modded to modern Trans Am). There are some niche markets where the geek appeal ought to be significant, such as Battlefront's hard core war gaming products, and their games based on the old Avalon Hill style of board game really shouldn't be that hard to port.
But the games that sell in the millions, like the EA stuff, just doesn't have enough raw geek appeal to make the geek market significant.
KFG
From 1900 to 1925 was significant.
From 1925 to 1950 was significant.
From 1950 to 1975 was significant, and I remember most of it.
From 1980 to now has been the most technologically boring period since Newton. There has been some evolution, but other than personal computers and the internet it's mostly an evolution of mature technologies. My stereo is 25 years old and there's no reason to replace it. If I took you for a ride blindfolded in a 1980 car and a new car you couldn't tell which was which.
While in some repects, being a technologist, I have much higher tech around my house than most, I live much lower tech than the average janitor, and yet, walking through my house, a good deal of the technology, even that in my bicycle, didn't really exist 100+ years ago.
All of it existed 25 years ago, although perhaps in nascent form, like the net, which I first bumped into circa 1976.
The 80s sucked. They've kept on sucking and we live in their vacuum.
KFG
In the old days it used to be hard to get small businesses to expose themselves to the net at all. They were paranoid about running so much as a webserver for simple customer services.
Nowadays it's getting tough to convince them they need to keep a computer offline to protect sensitive core business data, even if it means a bit of sneaker netting now and again.
Perhaps times will change again as they swing back to paranoid.
Real men may upload their data to ftp and let everyone else mirror it. Smart men pull the ethernet cord. If nothing else you don't want the IRS/SEC to be able to pull your data off of someone else's server. You can't wipe what you don't have sole possession of.
KFG
. . .but the good jail (just like in those other movies) - not the man jail.
Ah yes, the good old days of Mamie Van Doren wearing prison issue angora sweaters.
KFG
The quick honest answer is that you can't, and even lawyers depend upon other lawyers to defend themselves.
You can acquire a certain facility with the law, in some cases of specific law even a superiour facility than the legal general practitioner. This will allow you, at least, to do a reasonable job of arranging settlements and plea bargains, although not generally quite as good as you could obtain with a lawyer.
If only because the lawyer has a professional acquaintence with the judge and DA. They have a way of doing business with each other. You're just some scmuck.
But where even a mediocre lawyer is going to kill you, even in those circumstances where you know law and logic to a greater degree than the lawyer, is in purely procedural matters. The pure mechanics of moving a case through the courts. It's second nature to him, done without thought. It's terra incognito to you.
Just as a physicist may know more about mechanics than an engineer, but a civil engineer is more likely to build a sounder bridge.
Your only real defense is in that most cases are petty. They cost no more to capitulate to than to sucessfully defend against.
Spend what little money you have for lawyers up front, in drafting your contracts and business procedures. Become well acquaited with whatever boilerplate you might use. Use the law prophylatically and you have a better chance when representing yourself in court.
And when all else fails there's little you can do other than taking your losses with a benign resignation to fate. Don't take the failure personally. It isn't a moral issue. Pay the judgement, pick up the pieces and get on with your life, knowing that it would have likely cost as much to "win" anyway.
KFG
Kitchen countertops are.
Absolutely. The first thing I have to do with kitchen floor cabinets is build an additional frame under them to raise them them the 3 1/2" of a 2x4.
And I'm only 5'9".
I do virtually all the cooking in my household, a not entirely unusual arrangement these days. I want to to see countertops marketed at men.
If she wants to cook, she can put on heels, just like in those movies.
KFG
Ironically, a lot of women say the same thing about men.
So why is the first thing they do upon deciding that going to a store and buying just the handle?
I'd like to see one of those fix the car or move the piano.
KFG
Its like trying to hit the ground with a dart... you'll never miss.
Let me introduce you to my wife.
KFG
This sounds like a company that's gone parasitic on FUD.
Nothing sells better. Just watch TV ads for a while, or walk down the isles of a supermarket, particularly the drug/personal care isles.
It's all sold by sex and fear, and fear of not getting sex. The heartbreak of psoriasis. The social outcasting of dandruff. The horror of your whites not being white enough.
What will the neighbors think?
Most people live by FUD while pursuing their lives of quiet desperation, and most companies at least parasitically prey on that fear. Some of them subsist on it entirely, even going so far as to create fears, through marketing campaigns, that had never previously existed, and which their product "solves."
KFG
In reality you'll always find some clever lawyer or easily-swayed jury that rules the other way.
Without even going that far, the act of being sued can be devastating, even if you just fight for a year and then they back off and it never really goes to trial.
Let's say a hundred bucks or so every time your lawyer picks up the phone. Several hundred for a letter. A grand for a simple motion. A couple months of just futzin' around and the legal bills can add up in a hurry.
I know of a judge who treats every petty charge as if it were a federal case. Really comes down hard on everyone, right down to a simple parking violation. And yet if you look at his conviction records they're no different than average.
When asked what gives he said, " I make them have to get a lawyer. Now that is punishment."
It isn't usually losing a suit that hurts. It's simply being involved in one. You have to get a lawyer. And anyone can sue you over damned near anything.
KFG
Even though everyone slags off Amiga, someone always buys it when it goes up for sale.
Yeah. We've got a girl like that in my neighborhood too.
KFG