Sorry, I saw the post when it was modded "Score:2" and thought it was some random stupid comment, not a joke. You saw it when it was "Score:4, Funny", and you thought it was funny. You'd be surprised just how much impact the moderation has on how you read a post.
So I should buy a kindle because I can, through painstaking hours of getting things to work, install Ubuntu on it and get a crappy system that costs as much as a netbook but is worse in every way?
I'm not talking about copyright law. I'm talking about law in general. The law does not forbid dancing in circles with a bunny hat on your head, therefore you can dance in circles with a bunny hat on your head.
As for EULAs, are you suggesting that if I buy a book, I don't have a right to read it because I didn't agree to a license to do so? And how the heck does license-free software work then?
Yes, I do "just not like the Kindle". The reason I don't like it is the fact that Amazon controls the hardware. Even if, as you claim, it can only delete books you bought, that is still unacceptable.
Ships can, and should be reusable. In deep space. The solution is to decouple deep space travel and launch - when you're launching the ship you need multistage and some other tricks to escape the gravity well. But when you're in space you can use the same ship to travel to Mars and back twice, with only a refueling stop, since it takes rather little energy to propel yourself once you're out of Earth's gravity.
Black hole and dark matter have very precise meanings in physics. In fact, black holes aren't strictly black due to Hawking radiation and dark matter is transparent, not dark.
The EU is by many definitions a country. They have lighter restrictions on travel between individual states than many of the more restrictive countries do, they have a unified passport, a unified currency, a government; I'd say they're about at the same level as the US before the Civil War screwed it up and turned it federalist.
The upgrade was a bit rough - the GUI system update tools are very prone to breaking, often freezing to the point that only a forcequit can put things back to normal (I almost always use the command line because of that). Unfortunately the only way I knew of to update to 9.10 was using a GUI tool, which naturally broke, forcing me to restart the upgrade (although it was called a "partial upgrade". As for the finished product, booting time is abysmal, pushing past 100 sec. and the wireless doesn't work without a driver (it worked flawlessly in 9.04), and even with the driver whenever I move around any new wireless networks I come across aren't recognized - I need to suspend/unsuspend to restart the wireless system and get the new access points recognized. And the monitor randomly shuts off once in a while. And the mouse (trackpad) moves erratically sometimes.
Either I should switch to some other distro or I need better hardware.
I am not hurting anyone by downloading instead of not downloading. If you're going to test if an action is harmful you have to compare it against the neutral option of doing nothing at all, not against doing the best possible thing - otherwise doing anything but giving all your money to charity is hurting your potential beneficiaries.
As for Psystar, where did I mention Psystar in my post? I was refuting your false dichotomy between allowing both the GPL and EULAs and allowing neither, not commenting on Psystar.
I'm talking about how Amazon can force it to delete whatever they want from YOUR kindle. It means that you are not the absolute overlord of your own hardware, Amazon is, a fact that I find unacceptable.
I would completely give up the ability to consume non-public domain/CC/GPL content, both pirated and legitimate, if it meant getting rid of these laws. Now if we can get more people to take a stand for longer than the commercial breaks in American Idol, we might actually have a chance.
By default you have the right to do whatever you want. So the onus is on you to point to a source that says that copyright law prevents you from using software. I claim that only EULAs restrict you in that way.
The GPL does not impose restrictions that are not in copyright law. Let me spell it out for you:
Normal copyright: You cannot distribute without distributing source. You cannot distribute with distributing source. You can use in any way you want as long as you're not distributing.
GPL: You cannot distribute without distributing source. You can distribute with distributing source. You can use in any way you want as long as you're not distributing.
EULA: You cannot distribute without distributing source. You cannot distribute with distributing source. You cannot use in any way you want as long as you're not distributing.
Notice how the GPL only grants rights while the EULA takes them away?
There is a BIG difference between using and reselling. Using something in your home harms no one, even if you illegally downloaded it. Reselling harms the original seller because you're competing with them.
Slashdot Mirror
Sorry, I saw the post when it was modded "Score:2" and thought it was some random stupid comment, not a joke. You saw it when it was "Score:4, Funny", and you thought it was funny. You'd be surprised just how much impact the moderation has on how you read a post.
So I should buy a kindle because I can, through painstaking hours of getting things to work, install Ubuntu on it and get a crappy system that costs as much as a netbook but is worse in every way?
I'm not talking about copyright law. I'm talking about law in general. The law does not forbid dancing in circles with a bunny hat on your head, therefore you can dance in circles with a bunny hat on your head.
As for EULAs, are you suggesting that if I buy a book, I don't have a right to read it because I didn't agree to a license to do so? And how the heck does license-free software work then?
Well, to continue the Slashdot tradition:
Just like whoosh has a very precise meaning on Slashdot.
Fixed.
Yes, I do "just not like the Kindle". The reason I don't like it is the fact that Amazon controls the hardware. Even if, as you claim, it can only delete books you bought, that is still unacceptable.
Ships can, and should be reusable. In deep space. The solution is to decouple deep space travel and launch - when you're launching the ship you need multistage and some other tricks to escape the gravity well. But when you're in space you can use the same ship to travel to Mars and back twice, with only a refueling stop, since it takes rather little energy to propel yourself once you're out of Earth's gravity.
Black hole and dark matter have very precise meanings in physics. In fact, black holes aren't strictly black due to Hawking radiation and dark matter is transparent, not dark.
The EU is by many definitions a country. They have lighter restrictions on travel between individual states than many of the more restrictive countries do, they have a unified passport, a unified currency, a government; I'd say they're about at the same level as the US before the Civil War screwed it up and turned it federalist.
Every good government goes bad eventually. That's why we need a revolution once every few hundred years to keep society working.
Content producers often tend to get their launch dates wrong. For example, the advertised launch date for Wolverine was off by a month!
Generally, you want to post logged in to undo your moderations. If you have 5 other moderations that you don't want to lose, that's fine however.
The upgrade was a bit rough - the GUI system update tools are very prone to breaking, often freezing to the point that only a forcequit can put things back to normal (I almost always use the command line because of that). Unfortunately the only way I knew of to update to 9.10 was using a GUI tool, which naturally broke, forcing me to restart the upgrade (although it was called a "partial upgrade". As for the finished product, booting time is abysmal, pushing past 100 sec. and the wireless doesn't work without a driver (it worked flawlessly in 9.04), and even with the driver whenever I move around any new wireless networks I come across aren't recognized - I need to suspend/unsuspend to restart the wireless system and get the new access points recognized. And the monitor randomly shuts off once in a while. And the mouse (trackpad) moves erratically sometimes.
Either I should switch to some other distro or I need better hardware.
I am not hurting anyone by downloading instead of not downloading. If you're going to test if an action is harmful you have to compare it against the neutral option of doing nothing at all, not against doing the best possible thing - otherwise doing anything but giving all your money to charity is hurting your potential beneficiaries.
As for Psystar, where did I mention Psystar in my post? I was refuting your false dichotomy between allowing both the GPL and EULAs and allowing neither, not commenting on Psystar.
Wow, all those rhymes just over some crooks fighting over a book.
I'm talking about how Amazon can force it to delete whatever they want from YOUR kindle. It means that you are not the absolute overlord of your own hardware, Amazon is, a fact that I find unacceptable.
Both patents AND lawyers are evil and only encourage stealing.
I would completely give up the ability to consume non-public domain/CC/GPL content, both pirated and legitimate, if it meant getting rid of these laws. Now if we can get more people to take a stand for longer than the commercial breaks in American Idol, we might actually have a chance.
Because virtualization is the 2009 buzzword of the year. Next year it'll be a cloud hotspot or something.
Compared to yours?
Google's main purpose in developing Chrome is currently as the browser in Chrome OS, so it's natural that they would optimize it for Linux.
By default you have the right to do whatever you want. So the onus is on you to point to a source that says that copyright law prevents you from using software. I claim that only EULAs restrict you in that way.
The GPL does not impose restrictions that are not in copyright law. Let me spell it out for you:
Normal copyright: You cannot distribute without distributing source. You cannot distribute with distributing source. You can use in any way you want as long as you're not distributing.
GPL: You cannot distribute without distributing source. You can distribute with distributing source. You can use in any way you want as long as you're not distributing.
EULA: You cannot distribute without distributing source. You cannot distribute with distributing source. You cannot use in any way you want as long as you're not distributing.
Notice how the GPL only grants rights while the EULA takes them away?
There is a BIG difference between using and reselling. Using something in your home harms no one, even if you illegally downloaded it. Reselling harms the original seller because you're competing with them.
Or you can live in a world where copyright restricts distribution but not use, like it should, and you get the GPL working but not the EULA.
The fact that there is a limited number of prison slots pretty much all of which are currently full.