Re:Make companies pay for software they can't use?
on
Microsoft and the GPL
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· Score: 2
Blockquoth the poster:
The difference is that if Microsoft spends their own money to enhance the base software, you think you're somehow entitled to get a free ride off their work.
Sort of like the free ride they'd be getting off the original code...
Of course, if a piece of software is GPLd, Microsoft would be crazy to spend their time and money on extending it with an expectation of monetary profit. The GPL denies them that option. (There could be ancillary benefits, such as enhanced recognition or just getting the fratzen job done, but such probably wouldn't motivate a company like Microsoft.)
Without the ability to charge for extending GPL code, companies most likely won't do much extending. Then you get into a philosophical debate: Supporters of the GPL would say that if extensions need be proprietary, then they're worse than leaving the code unextended. In other words, you automatically lose more by closing the source than any functionality you gain through the new resources thrown at the problem.
I think it's far from proven that such is the case, but it's an interesting view of the world. One must remember that the GPL and its backers are not philosophy-neutral; they have a vision of what "right programming" is.
Well, I strongly resent the label that was applied to me... Bigoted I might be (though I believe not), but I like to think of myself as far from typical...:)
Just for the record, I have looked at the screenshots, as well as much of what Microsoft has said about SmartTags. I've also read, for example, the Washington Post article about how Microsoft SmartTags would be sprinkled on the Post's sports pages. Admittedly, I haven't downloaded and played with the SDK. I honestly don't think it's necessary to invest intensely in a piece of software before drawing some conclusions about its fundamental utility.
Anyway, the rants have taken off far better than I could, so I'll end it here.
Sorry, but if you are aware of the "infringement", and do nothing about it, you have just given an implicit license.
This is, of course, utter nonsense.
First, one need not defend copyright the way one needs defend a trademark. Copyright doesn't cease to apply simply because I haven't sued anyone yet.
Second, you're essentially saying that Microsoft, or any other company, could render all of my pages public domain by introducing a browser that sprinkles "Brought to you by Microsoft" in the page. Since I haven't disabled it, I'm not protecting my copyright... so it's public domain. Er?
Third, what about sites that have been around for years or are extremely large? If they were standards-compliant before, why should the burden fall upon me to "fix" something that wasn't broken? It would seem that it would be Microsoft's responsibility to make this work, not mine.
The suggested links aren't even as blatantly pro-Microsoft as you might think.
I don't care if the example linked to Dr. Seuss and a page of smileys. The issue is not the content, per se, of the Smart Tags. The issue is that Microsoft is attempting wrest control of the content, layout, and linkage of a page away from the creator of a page. They have no business doing that. If I wanted to offer my readers access to, say, MSFT on the market, I'd put a link in for them. If they want to see MSFT on the market, they can open their favorite page to check stocks. Microsoft has no business being in this transaction, overlayering its preferences, habits, and designs on us.
It might be paranoid slippery-slope reasoning, but why should I believe the innocuous nature of a thing offered for public consumption? Even as described by Microsoft this system has tremendous potential for corporate abuse... I don't need to see a screenshot of the more nefarious parts in action just to know that they're lurking out there.
What other reasons are there to resist these smart tags?
How about, to preserve the integrity of an author's design? Smart Tags are a way for an outside agency to modify my pages on the fly, in ways I do not approve of. Why should I, or any author, surrender that control? How can it possibly be good for a third party to intervene between me and my readers?
Smart Tags are just another way to wedge in control and wrest it from content creators toward content "providers" and content controllers.
Well, I might just be a paranoid but... I keep seeing "The license isn't available yet" and "It will allow hands-on usage". Until the license is available, none of those statements count for diddly. It's not beyond the tactics of MS marketing to make a goody-goody announcement, reap the good PR, and then release something that, um, fails to live up to the hype. By the time the license is available, the press will have moved on...
Um, like it or loath it, C# and.NET -- if pursued through "shared source" -- will have real impact on the Open Source community. It's not clear if it will drain vitality, or energeize, or wash over that community... but it's sure to have an impact.
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As such, it seems to me that O'Rielly is merely logically following a trend that will impact his core community.
I'm amazed -- and a little frightened -- by how many slashdotters assume exposure == legitimacy, or that information == support.
but DirecTV does deserve compensation for their service.
I am more and more amazed at the number of people who apparently believe that the mere act of spending money entitles you to a return on your investment. Let's get this straight: No one "deserves" money just because they put their money, time, or effort into a project. They should have made an intelligent forecast of their likely return. If they guessed wrong, it really isn't the government's problem, or mine.
However, I -do- think that the majority of society are idiots and would see this and think that all hackers are out to steal cable or whatever.
Hmmm. This raises an interesting point. Many people seem to feel that "stealing" cable is OK if you get away with it. I have at least three friends who found their cable accidentally on before they ordered it, and who merrily watched for months without paying. These people feel themselves to be upright, law-abiding citizens, too.
I wonder if this is the sort of hack that makes hacking more respectable, because people can understand and identify with it?
(c) It's about a somewhat-offbeat use of technology.
I think it pretty clearly falls under "News for Nerds". It sounds to me like you wouldn't want the NY Times reporting on, say, a drug problem in Central Park because that facilitates people finding places to buy drugs.
Now what comes out, when he is done, is quite beatiful. He has done some truly wonderful images. But here in lies the question...is he an artist?
I would say no, mostly because the wireframes aren't his. But that is a pretty fine line
So someone isn't an artist unless he makes the paint, the canvas, the brushes, etc., for himself? What about "found art"? At some point it becomes ridiculous to equate art with manufacture.
On the other hand, someone who cuts up various masterpieces to make a collage might not be art... how much has to be original? And is anything really, truly, totally orginal, anyway?
Yes, but it SEEMS easier. It's a lot easier to create something that looks like artwork ("hey I'll just take this photograph and apply three random filters... wow that looks nifty!") with photoshop than it is to do the same with paint.
And there's the true danger in computers: For the truly gifted, they can make "good" talent transcendant... but for the banal, they make bad art easy. You can see it in almost any facet of computerization: Does word processing make it easier to write? Then more people write (generally) bad stuff... because the bar is lower. Can PowerPoint make presentations that really fly? Sure... but it also makes it easy to make horrid mutant presentations, the horror of which would have been inconceivable before.
One of the challenges of the 21st century, especially for a creative type, is to make truly good stuff stand out against the vast noise of the now-too-easy. (And lest you think I'm being totally elitist, I admit to being one of those who make bad 3D art simply because POV-Ray is available and free.
Does this mean that a poster to Slashdot could later demand that it be deleted?
I am very far from being a lawyer, but my instinct is, "No." Posting to slashdot gives permission for slashdot to publish it. (Sort of a duh-huh principle.) This decision revolved around things originally published on paper and then republished on the Web. The question was, is that a valid "archivation" or is it a new publication?
Although I regret that we might lose a lot of content, I think the Supremes got this one right: Puiblication on the Web is a distribution in a new form, not just an archive. How does it work with, say, books-on-tape? I would assume authors must consent to that before a publishing house can release it.
That groovey seating was in fact a Cray. There is no purpose to that scence (other than the plot dissemnation)
I disagree. There is a prosaic use, which is that the room is soundproof and not bugged. There are deeper, more symbolic interpretations: First, that Cosmo's bosses haven't bugged the computer room, meaning they still don't "get" the impact of computers everywhere (as Cosmo does). Second, that Cosmo in times of trouble turns to his devices, not his henchmen or any friedns. Third, that the computer is again a mediator of secrets (as is the theme of the movie). Fourth, that Cosmo -- with his magic black box -- ironically doesn't notice he's relying on a computer for secrecy.
Did the scriptwriter or director intend all of those? Any of them? I'd be surprised. But that's what makes it art: It resonates with us on levels far surpassing the conscious intent of the artist.
There's a war out there, old friend. A world war. And it's not about who's got the most bullets. It's about who controls the information. What we see and hear, how we work, what we think... it's all about the information!
teaching results in nothing directly tangible while software development does
You can actually touch your software? Not the medium it's on; not the hardware that runs it; but the software itself?... I am impressed.
Kidding aside, I don't want to overdo the analogy but if Open Source is about anything remotely like money, it's about finding new ways to make money off common property... about finding a way to innovate without demarcating something as "mine! mine! mine!"
to wit, I work as a Windows developer on a closed-source application. I cannot use a GPL'ed library in my app
OK, but you can't use a closed-source, proprietary library written by a company down the street, either. Well, you can't without licensing it, which would generally involve a fee. A fee is an amount of money given up in return for something else. In other worse, a fee is an opportunity cost, since you no longer have those dollars to spend as you wish.
With GPL code, you cannot use the GPL library without giving up options. Specifically, you accept limitations on your future behavior because the terms of the license, to which you have agreed, include not selling the derived work. You've surrendered some flexibility and have thus paid an opportunity cost, since you no longer have some options available.
Personally, I don't see how the GPL is any more "evil" than the company with the proprietary library. Is that company evil because you can't use its library without paying a cost? At least with the GPL, you get some unusual advantages: Complete access to the source and complete assurance that, at least, your competitor will not be able to take your code and drive you out of business with it.
Is GPL the be-all, end-all? No. Is it evil and a threat to the very fundaments of the God-fearing, freedom-loving blessed Republic? No. It's just a license.
How long do you think any business is going to last when everything it does is common knowledge.
I teach at a school. Everything we do is "common knowledge", yet parents pay us $19,000 per kid for a seat. And that's despite free altneratives in the area.
Though, to be fair, schools are not businesses. Nonetheless, what Microsoft seems upset about is that GPL forces you to find new business models...
Tensors are the things mathematicians use to scare their children into behaving...:)
OK, more technically correct, tensors are like a generalization of vectors. They can be defined through the way they behave under rotations. And you're right: tensors are often represented through matrices.
In this forumulation, a scalar is a tensor of rank 0, a vector is a tensor of rank 1, and so on. Tensors are real bears to deal with. I went through an undergraduate program in Physics and never encountered them... they only really popped up in a class on General Relativity. Ugh.
Having just written an AP Physics solution for my students on just this topic, I'm relatively sure. Here's the reasoning:
The centripetal force, Fc, must be provided by gravity alone, Fg. So
Fc = Fg
m v^2/r = GMm / r^2
v^2 = GM/r
v proportional to 1/sqrt(r)
QED
You might be thinking of Kepler's Third Law, which says that the square of the period is proportional to the cube of the distance. We can get there from here if we recall that
v = dist/time = 2 pi r / T
where T is the period. Plugging that in above we'd have
Bill Gates wants something for nothing. He wants developers to invest time and energy on a problem, then allow MS to sweep in and seize it. Or does Mr. Bill have a problem with a (closed-source) company that creates a bautiful piece of software but only allows him to use it if he pays a fee? After all, that's restricting his rights, too.
The problem is that Bill Gates (like many) believe that it's OK to charge money for something (prob. because he has a lot of that) but not OK to exact what economists call an "opportunity cost": The GPL "charges" you via its restrictions on your future actions: Yes, you can use my code, but No, you can't close it off from others.
Seen in that light, the GPL is capitalist, too. It's just using a different measure of value than the almighty dollar. The only argument against the GPL -- and it's a weak one -- would be that companies don't understand the restrictions it places on them, so they could be "suckered" into underwritng code they intended to sell but cannot. On the other hand, I doubt Mr. Bill would have much sympathy for companies that bought a single license for Win NT and installed it on too many machines, because they thought it was a site license. I'm pretty sure Mr. Bill would say, "Tough -- you should have understood the license."
Companies that don't like the GPL are not prohibited from existing or competing. Of course, they'll have to "reinvent the wheel" on a lot of things, and they'll face the greater efficiency of an installed base and dedicated developers. While they're back-engineering the GPL'd code, the developers will be moving forward. Oh, well.... they can compete. No one gives them a preordained right to win.
The GPL is relatively clear and straightforward. A company that uses it without understanding it deserves what they get.
I wonder how long it will be before we debunk all quantum mechanics?
Well, first we'd sort of have to start debunking any of quantum mechanics...
I don't recall ever seeing anything that threw the fundamental basis of QM (OK, really, QED) into doubt. Indeed, quite the opposite -- things like the Aspect experiments, the stuff about Bell's inequality, and even the "teleportation" stuff seem to say, the Universe is actually as weird as QM makes it out to be.
Slashdot Mirror
Of course, if a piece of software is GPLd, Microsoft would be crazy to spend their time and money on extending it with an expectation of monetary profit. The GPL denies them that option. (There could be ancillary benefits, such as enhanced recognition or just getting the fratzen job done, but such probably wouldn't motivate a company like Microsoft.)
Without the ability to charge for extending GPL code, companies most likely won't do much extending. Then you get into a philosophical debate: Supporters of the GPL would say that if extensions need be proprietary, then they're worse than leaving the code unextended. In other words, you automatically lose more by closing the source than any functionality you gain through the new resources thrown at the problem.
I think it's far from proven that such is the case, but it's an interesting view of the world. One must remember that the GPL and its backers are not philosophy-neutral; they have a vision of what "right programming" is.
Just for the record, I have looked at the screenshots, as well as much of what Microsoft has said about SmartTags. I've also read, for example, the Washington Post article about how Microsoft SmartTags would be sprinkled on the Post's sports pages. Admittedly, I haven't downloaded and played with the SDK. I honestly don't think it's necessary to invest intensely in a piece of software before drawing some conclusions about its fundamental utility.
Anyway, the rants have taken off far better than I could, so I'll end it here.
First, one need not defend copyright the way one needs defend a trademark. Copyright doesn't cease to apply simply because I haven't sued anyone yet.
Second, you're essentially saying that Microsoft, or any other company, could render all of my pages public domain by introducing a browser that sprinkles "Brought to you by Microsoft" in the page. Since I haven't disabled it, I'm not protecting my copyright... so it's public domain. Er?
Third, what about sites that have been around for years or are extremely large? If they were standards-compliant before, why should the burden fall upon me to "fix" something that wasn't broken? It would seem that it would be Microsoft's responsibility to make this work, not mine.
It might be paranoid slippery-slope reasoning, but why should I believe the innocuous nature of a thing offered for public consumption? Even as described by Microsoft this system has tremendous potential for corporate abuse... I don't need to see a screenshot of the more nefarious parts in action just to know that they're lurking out there.
Smart Tags are just another way to wedge in control and wrest it from content creators toward content "providers" and content controllers.
Well, I might just be a paranoid but... I keep seeing "The license isn't available yet" and "It will allow hands-on usage". Until the license is available, none of those statements count for diddly. It's not beyond the tactics of MS marketing to make a goody-goody announcement, reap the good PR, and then release something that, um, fails to live up to the hype. By the time the license is available, the press will have moved on...
. As such, it seems to me that O'Rielly is merely logically following a trend that will impact his core community.
I'm amazed -- and a little frightened -- by how many slashdotters assume exposure == legitimacy, or that information == support.
It is dangerous to begin assuming that people simply cannot be trusted with information. Haystack security is unstable.
I wonder if this is the sort of hack that makes hacking more respectable, because people can understand and identify with it?
(b) It's news.
(c) It's about a somewhat-offbeat use of technology.
I think it pretty clearly falls under "News for Nerds". It sounds to me like you wouldn't want the NY Times reporting on, say, a drug problem in Central Park because that facilitates people finding places to buy drugs.
On the other hand, someone who cuts up various masterpieces to make a collage might not be art... how much has to be original? And is anything really, truly, totally orginal, anyway?
One of the challenges of the 21st century, especially for a creative type, is to make truly good stuff stand out against the vast noise of the now-too-easy. (And lest you think I'm being totally elitist, I admit to being one of those who make bad 3D art simply because POV-Ray is available and free.
Although I regret that we might lose a lot of content, I think the Supremes got this one right: Puiblication on the Web is a distribution in a new form, not just an archive. How does it work with, say, books-on-tape? I would assume authors must consent to that before a publishing house can release it.
Did the scriptwriter or director intend all of those? Any of them? I'd be surprised. But that's what makes it art: It resonates with us on levels far surpassing the conscious intent of the artist.
The film was about 10 years too early, but it amazes me how much it captured.
Kidding aside, I don't want to overdo the analogy but if Open Source is about anything remotely like money, it's about finding new ways to make money off common property... about finding a way to innovate without demarcating something as "mine! mine! mine!"
With GPL code, you cannot use the GPL library without giving up options. Specifically, you accept limitations on your future behavior because the terms of the license, to which you have agreed, include not selling the derived work. You've surrendered some flexibility and have thus paid an opportunity cost, since you no longer have some options available.
Personally, I don't see how the GPL is any more "evil" than the company with the proprietary library. Is that company evil because you can't use its library without paying a cost? At least with the GPL, you get some unusual advantages: Complete access to the source and complete assurance that, at least, your competitor will not be able to take your code and drive you out of business with it.
Is GPL the be-all, end-all? No. Is it evil and a threat to the very fundaments of the God-fearing, freedom-loving blessed Republic? No. It's just a license.
Though, to be fair, schools are not businesses. Nonetheless, what Microsoft seems upset about is that GPL forces you to find new business models...
OK, more technically correct, tensors are like a generalization of vectors. They can be defined through the way they behave under rotations. And you're right: tensors are often represented through matrices.
In this forumulation, a scalar is a tensor of rank 0, a vector is a tensor of rank 1, and so on. Tensors are real bears to deal with. I went through an undergraduate program in Physics and never encountered them... they only really popped up in a class on General Relativity. Ugh.
The centripetal force, Fc, must be provided by gravity alone, Fg. So
You might be thinking of Kepler's Third Law, which says that the square of the period is proportional to the cube of the distance. We can get there from here if we recall that where T is the period. Plugging that in above we'd have Ta-da!The problem is that Bill Gates (like many) believe that it's OK to charge money for something (prob. because he has a lot of that) but not OK to exact what economists call an "opportunity cost": The GPL "charges" you via its restrictions on your future actions: Yes, you can use my code, but No, you can't close it off from others.
Seen in that light, the GPL is capitalist, too. It's just using a different measure of value than the almighty dollar. The only argument against the GPL -- and it's a weak one -- would be that companies don't understand the restrictions it places on them, so they could be "suckered" into underwritng code they intended to sell but cannot. On the other hand, I doubt Mr. Bill would have much sympathy for companies that bought a single license for Win NT and installed it on too many machines, because they thought it was a site license. I'm pretty sure Mr. Bill would say, "Tough -- you should have understood the license."
Companies that don't like the GPL are not prohibited from existing or competing. Of course, they'll have to "reinvent the wheel" on a lot of things, and they'll face the greater efficiency of an installed base and dedicated developers. While they're back-engineering the GPL'd code, the developers will be moving forward. Oh, well.... they can compete. No one gives them a preordained right to win.
The GPL is relatively clear and straightforward. A company that uses it without understanding it deserves what they get.
I don't recall ever seeing anything that threw the fundamental basis of QM (OK, really, QED) into doubt. Indeed, quite the opposite -- things like the Aspect experiments, the stuff about Bell's inequality, and even the "teleportation" stuff seem to say, the Universe is actually as weird as QM makes it out to be.