You do realise that a number of other apps do exactly the same thing, don't you? On my work PC (that I'm sat at right now) I see plugins installed for Java, Quicktime, Adobe Reader, iTunes, etc, none of which I remember explicitly choosing to install, none of which came from Mozilla's add-ons site (because they're plugins, not add-ons!)
The cardinal rule, as for as Firefox is concerned, is that the users rule.
The fact that Mozilla has remotely disabled a plugin (the WPF one) on my browser without asking my permission or giving me a simple way to re-enable it would seem to contradict this statement.
I think that given this situation Mozilla did the right thing.
And I disagree. I am extremely uncomfortable to know that my browser vendor can - if it so wishes (and I'm not about to claim that this is a slippery slope, etc) - remotely disable arbitrary plugins on my system, leaving me with no way to re-enable them.
While I appreciate the motivation for the block, and that it was done with MS's consent, this is my system, and ultimately it should be within my control, not theirs.
A quick check of the list of plugins installed in Firefox on the machine I'm currently sat in front of shows that I have plugins for Quicktime, iTunes, Adobe Acrobat, the JVM, etc. I don't remember explicitly allowing any of them to be installed.
If you're going to haul MS over the coals for silently installing a browser plugin, you might want to go after a few other companies too.
Or perhaps they were still on their friends list from before everything went sour, and they hadn't yet plucked up the courage to remove and block them?
Besides which the law exists precisely to punish people for doing things that they *can* do, but shouldn't.
you are stipulating Microsoft software and licensing as a prerequisite for any deployment or implementation of your work for a customer.
Well, where I work we tend to use whatever the customer wants us to use, at least in terms of the OS. We get asked for Windows,.NET, MS SQL Server, etc, just as we get asked for Linux, Java, Oracle, etc.
Besides which, the cost of the MS software is utterly dwarfed by some of the COTS products we've used - on my last project the CMS alone cost a quarter of a million GBP before we even started to customise it.
You realise you said the same thing in a slightly different, more explicit way, right? He said "This is what is good", not "this is one of the good things".
You're not wrong, but the OP didn't say anything at all about copying the game you don't want to pay for - he merely pointed out that if people (silently) stop paying for games, it'll be written off as being due to piracy, whether it is or not.
If I can't even hear what the artist sounds like why am I going to buy the album?
Oh but you will hear what the artist sounds like - via officially-sanctioned channels playing the current set of promoted artists and songs.
The things you mention are as much about controlling the promotion of music as they are about controlling access to it. That way the artists that the industry has decided will be pushed as the next big thing will become the next big thing, as that's what's being forced down people's throats.
Because having to read and enter a single, hard to read word is enough hassle for most people; two is stretching it. An entire sentence would be too much.
I doubt it; CCTV is common in the big cities but almost unheard of anywhere else - unless you count speed cameras, but they only take pictures of cars that trip their speed detectors.
The chances that these people were caught on CCTV is effectively zero.
Well, if you ask me the whole point of April Fool's Day is to try to fool people into believing something that isn't true - hence the name. (Or alternatively, fool them into not believing something that is true)
Posting half a dozen (or more) obviously fictitious stories doesn't seem to be in that spirit to me. That's what irks me, not so much the deluge of stupid stories but the apparent missing of the entire point of the day.
Of course you can! It's just an involved April Fool's hoax - after all, if they didn't implement *something* it wouldn't be very convincing at all, would it? As it is, is anyone here *not* wondering if maybe, just maybe, it's not a hoax after all?
I've been looking into CAPTCHAs and related anti-abuse measures recently for a project I'm on, and came across exactly that solution described elsewhere (though they used display: none to hide it). It's really quite brilliant in its simplicity. Sure, it won't defeat a targeted, thorough attack in which a human writes a bot to submit that exact form, but for the vast majority it should work pretty well.
As a developer, isn't the point to write better/more robust code??
As a developer, yes. However, that is not and never has been an aim of this website. This website exists to provide CmdrTaco with interesting stuff to read (read the FAQ), and he and the other admins are all very heavily pro-FOSS and anti-MS.
I'm tired of the often mindless bias too, but you really should know what to expect when you read this site by now.
Slashdot Mirror
You do realise that a number of other apps do exactly the same thing, don't you? On my work PC (that I'm sat at right now) I see plugins installed for Java, Quicktime, Adobe Reader, iTunes, etc, none of which I remember explicitly choosing to install, none of which came from Mozilla's add-ons site (because they're plugins, not add-ons!)
The cardinal rule, as for as Firefox is concerned, is that the users rule.
The fact that Mozilla has remotely disabled a plugin (the WPF one) on my browser without asking my permission or giving me a simple way to re-enable it would seem to contradict this statement.
I don't think anyone will have any problem launching a nuclear reactor into space
Well, I've read people arguing that it's too dangerous because of the risk of rocket failure on or shortly after lift-off.
Not saying that's the majority view by any means, but it is a view.
I think that given this situation Mozilla did the right thing.
And I disagree. I am extremely uncomfortable to know that my browser vendor can - if it so wishes (and I'm not about to claim that this is a slippery slope, etc) - remotely disable arbitrary plugins on my system, leaving me with no way to re-enable them.
While I appreciate the motivation for the block, and that it was done with MS's consent, this is my system, and ultimately it should be within my control, not theirs.
A quick check of the list of plugins installed in Firefox on the machine I'm currently sat in front of shows that I have plugins for Quicktime, iTunes, Adobe Acrobat, the JVM, etc. I don't remember explicitly allowing any of them to be installed.
If you're going to haul MS over the coals for silently installing a browser plugin, you might want to go after a few other companies too.
Or perhaps they were still on their friends list from before everything went sour, and they hadn't yet plucked up the courage to remove and block them?
Besides which the law exists precisely to punish people for doing things that they *can* do, but shouldn't.
The RC1 build was also freely available for download; I'm running it at home myself.
you are stipulating Microsoft software and licensing as a prerequisite for any deployment or implementation of your work for a customer.
Well, where I work we tend to use whatever the customer wants us to use, at least in terms of the OS. We get asked for Windows, .NET, MS SQL Server, etc, just as we get asked for Linux, Java, Oracle, etc.
Besides which, the cost of the MS software is utterly dwarfed by some of the COTS products we've used - on my last project the CMS alone cost a quarter of a million GBP before we even started to customise it.
You realise you said the same thing in a slightly different, more explicit way, right? He said "This is what is good", not "this is one of the good things".
You're not wrong, but the OP didn't say anything at all about copying the game you don't want to pay for - he merely pointed out that if people (silently) stop paying for games, it'll be written off as being due to piracy, whether it is or not.
If I can't even hear what the artist sounds like why am I going to buy the album?
Oh but you will hear what the artist sounds like - via officially-sanctioned channels playing the current set of promoted artists and songs.
The things you mention are as much about controlling the promotion of music as they are about controlling access to it. That way the artists that the industry has decided will be pushed as the next big thing will become the next big thing, as that's what's being forced down people's throats.
What would be a better title?
'Some UK Musicians Back Watered-Down "Three Strikes" Rule'?
Because having to read and enter a single, hard to read word is enough hassle for most people; two is stretching it. An entire sentence would be too much.
I wonder if this angry mob was caught on CCTV?
I doubt it; CCTV is common in the big cities but almost unheard of anywhere else - unless you count speed cameras, but they only take pictures of cars that trip their speed detectors.
The chances that these people were caught on CCTV is effectively zero.
Well, if you ask me the whole point of April Fool's Day is to try to fool people into believing something that isn't true - hence the name. (Or alternatively, fool them into not believing something that is true)
Posting half a dozen (or more) obviously fictitious stories doesn't seem to be in that spirit to me. That's what irks me, not so much the deluge of stupid stories but the apparent missing of the entire point of the day.
No it isn't, and no, there really shouldn't...
It's not funny, and it's not a good April Fool; they're supposed to be at least part-way believable. If no-one falls for it, where is the fooling?
Of course you can! It's just an involved April Fool's hoax - after all, if they didn't implement *something* it wouldn't be very convincing at all, would it? As it is, is anyone here *not* wondering if maybe, just maybe, it's not a hoax after all?
And in a few years XP will reach its end of life and Microsoft will no longer support it.
What exactly is your point?
How is that ironic? Blair (Orwell's real name) was English after all.
Do this for the forst 100,000 links from google.
Google only returns at most 1000 links, no matter how many matches it finds. (A minor point I know)
My first thought was "make other humans". Somehow I can't see submitting a baby being a popular replacement for CAPTCHAs though...
I've been looking into CAPTCHAs and related anti-abuse measures recently for a project I'm on, and came across exactly that solution described elsewhere (though they used display: none to hide it). It's really quite brilliant in its simplicity. Sure, it won't defeat a targeted, thorough attack in which a human writes a bot to submit that exact form, but for the vast majority it should work pretty well.
Multiple related questions would be an particularly interesting area; for example, ask related questions where pronouns are ambiguous (to a computer).
Just like making the image too difficult to read, presenting too many challenges will cause people to give up and go elsewhere.
And that's different to any other corporate product branding exercise how exactly?
As a developer, isn't the point to write better/more robust code??
As a developer, yes. However, that is not and never has been an aim of this website. This website exists to provide CmdrTaco with interesting stuff to read (read the FAQ), and he and the other admins are all very heavily pro-FOSS and anti-MS.
I'm tired of the often mindless bias too, but you really should know what to expect when you read this site by now.