I live in Canada and I've had a high speed cable modem for 6 years now. Now I can't think of anyone I know that still connects through the phone line, unless it's adsl of course. I think it is basically because the government decided that everyone should have it and opened it all up for us. All I know is that I could never go back.
Do you know how your car works? Your fridge? The plane you fly on? Your phone? I program, so I consider my self technically savy, but I definitely have no idea (well I know the rough basics) and truthfully, I don't really care. I just want them to work. If I had to know the intimate details of every tool I used I wouldn't be able to get anything done.
This reminds me of certain responses from OSS programmers when told that grandpa can't use linux, 'He should learn how to use it' they say. Well he can build a house, live in the woods for years on his own. It's not like he's stupid. He just shouldn't be expected recompile his kernel or anything. Computers should be intuitive and operating systems transparent.
I noticed that they have a paypal account set up for bandwidth charges. So I thought it might be nicer to post the press release here, rather than bankrupt Ton from a thorough slashdotting.
********
New future for Blender as Free Software!
Today the shareholders of NaN Holding have reached an agreement on the outlines for a new future for Blender. In general it means that a non-profit organisation (the Blender Foundation) will be enabled to execute its plans, including Blender development as an 'open source' or 'free software' project. Details of this agreement will be studied on and negotiated during the next week, hopefully resulting in signing contracts next friday july 12.
What the NaN shareholders and the Foundation agree on: - putting the full Blender sources, including old and new development, in the public domain under a GNU GPL (or similar) license. - the Foundation will pay an initial fee of 100k euro for this (95k USD) - the Foundation can exploit the website and re-establish e-shop services - NaN Holding will be sufficiently enabled to (re)start business in the future, for example licensing derived technology or special services.
NaN Holding recognizes that, giving all circumstances and the current economic situation, moving on with Blender to this next stage will be the most beneficial thing to do, to protect past investments, but also to respect everything that has been realized until now by the NaN companies and the world-wide user community.
I am very happy we were able to make this tough decision, hopefully it will become a historical step. Details on the activities to gather funding will be made public here soon. Stay tuned!
I've subscribed to salon for almost a year now and think it is a great deal. For $20 a year you get a lot of content. Lots of stuff for us geeks as well. Look back in the past couple of months and see how many times stories have been links to salon articles and you'll see what I mean. A great site and worth saving.
How does this compare...
on
Gnome 2.0 RC1
·
· Score: 0
Can anyone tell me how Gnome 2 will compare with KDE 3? It seems like KDE has been 'ahead' for a while now and if this will even things up for some more.
On schedule?
on
Gnome 2.0 RC1
·
· Score: 1, Insightful
According to this (from the dot.plan):
June 07 RELEASE - Gnome 2.0 Desktop Release Candidate 1
As far as I know, there is no clause in the GPL that states that whatever project uses GNU components must prepend its name with GNU/ (if such a clause existed then it would not meet the requirements of being 'free' software). Therefore, I think RMS should shut the fuck up. I don't think Linus or anyone is saying that GNU is not an important part of linux. If RMS is sincere about this ridiculous crusade then he should prepend all GNU unix commands with GNU. Want to list files in a directory? GNU/ls. Don't feel like typing that all the time? Well I don't feel like adding it to the beginning of Linux.
Sounds like RMS is trying to take away our freedom to call Linux whatever we want. Personally I would have went with FuckRMSix.
In the end 'A rose by any other name...' and all that.
yeah, except for the fact that the US PATRIOT act was extrememly popular, supported by the vast majority of americans. That doesn't make it any less stupid, but practically everyone was behind it at the time it was proposed.
So never then, that's a very long time. I don't really see why we have to wait until we treat humans with dignity before we stop treating animals like in that video.
You say end of story, as if no other argument can possibly refute yours, and then you end your post with a disparaging comment on sweeping generalizations? Nice.
So someone speaks out against PETA gets 4 (insightful), I defend them and get marked as offtopic? We don't need the government to enforce censorship we'll gladly do it ourselve. I've had enough of this, back to work.
Fellow geek here. Not only a geek, but a vegan as well. I don't see how making some lame comment about PETA gets to be insightful, but anyways... I invite you to check out these realmedia clips here and here, and tell me that PETA doesn't have a cause worth fighting for.
Personally seeing shit like this makes me forget about how important open source is and focus on more important things.
The new version of Napster will not be using MP3's, it will be using a new proprietary format called.NAP. This will of course include all the rights management feature that you know and love. Why would anyone use this? I have no idea.
As an aside, a service that I would be willing to pay for is My.MP3.com. I loved that service when it was fully operations with ALL my cd's. Since a lot of my CD's have been removed and that it randomly asked to put the cd's in again I find it useless.
I own over 200 CD's and I bought quite a few from listening to music I found off bearshare (and previously Napster). Why don't they get it?
The most effective way to detect steganographic changes is have the original unmodified picture and comparing it bit by bit to the modified one. So if you use this form of encryption modify vacation photos and not well known pictures like the Mona Lisa.
Here is a cool page about using steganography in mp3 files, source and everything.
Good argument. However who is deciding if the help is worth the hurt? It sure ain't me or probably anyone else around here. Ecosystems are very delicate and we are all effected by living in them. I think that it is only right that we citizens have a democratic say in what is done to our surroundings.
Personally I don't want to wake up and find my yard covered in Monsanto Super Dandelions(TM).
moo.
that if they are going to continue to make trek series (which they are because it is still very profitable) then they should stop making series based on the federation and base it on something more interesting. My suggestion would be the romulans, but that is just my opinion. I think maybe 4 series and numerous movies based on boring "good guy" humans is probably enough. Time to go milk another cash cow.
THis is a game that I would truly love to see. I was positively addicted to the original and was always surprised that a sequel was never made. I enjoyed it more than any incarnation of civilization in fact.
I think its dangerous to assume that only those "fascist countries over there" are being monitered, especially after the discovery of Carnivore and even the local police taking part as seen in this article from wired.
It is also dangerous to imply causation. Even if you prove that Napster users buy more music, you can't say that Napster causes people to buy more music.
Kind of like how university students buy less music, but can't say that napster is the cause of this. High tution costs would obviously have no effect on the amount of music they buy. Funny how the RIAA doesn't see that this argument works both ways.
Slashdot Mirror
I live in Canada and I've had a high speed cable modem for 6 years now. Now I can't think of anyone I know that still connects through the phone line, unless it's adsl of course. I think it is basically because the government decided that everyone should have it and opened it all up for us. All I know is that I could never go back.
Or we could post directly to the ad free version, right here
I wonder if a slashdotting will take it down?
-1 obvious joke.
Or how about: the extra bandwidth charges definitely wil put them under.
Do you know how your car works? Your fridge? The plane you fly on? Your phone? I program, so I consider my self technically savy, but I definitely have no idea (well I know the rough basics) and truthfully, I don't really care. I just want them to work. If I had to know the intimate details of every tool I used I wouldn't be able to get anything done.
This reminds me of certain responses from OSS programmers when told that grandpa can't use linux, 'He should learn how to use it' they say. Well he can build a house, live in the woods for years on his own. It's not like he's stupid. He just shouldn't be expected recompile his kernel or anything. Computers should be intuitive and operating systems transparent.
just my two cents.
I noticed that they have a paypal account set up for bandwidth charges. So I thought it might be nicer to post the press release here, rather than bankrupt Ton from a thorough slashdotting.
********
New future for Blender as Free Software!
Today the shareholders of NaN Holding have reached an agreement on the outlines for a new future for Blender. In general it means that a non-profit organisation (the Blender Foundation) will be enabled to execute its plans, including Blender development as an 'open source' or 'free software' project.
Details of this agreement will be studied on and negotiated during the next week, hopefully resulting in signing contracts next friday july 12.
What the NaN shareholders and the Foundation agree on:
- putting the full Blender sources, including old and new development, in the public domain under a GNU GPL (or similar) license.
- the Foundation will pay an initial fee of 100k euro for this (95k USD)
- the Foundation can exploit the website and re-establish e-shop services
- NaN Holding will be sufficiently enabled to (re)start business in the future, for example licensing derived technology or special services.
NaN Holding recognizes that, giving all circumstances and the current economic situation, moving on with Blender to this next stage will be the most beneficial thing to do, to protect past investments, but also to respect everything that has been realized until now by the NaN companies and the world-wide user community.
I am very happy we were able to make this tough decision, hopefully it will become a historical step. Details on the activities to gather funding will be made public here soon. Stay tuned!
Ton Roosendaal, July 5, 2002
ton@blender3d.com
The press release and proposal are both lcated here.
Congratulations Ton and everyone. This will be a great addition to the OSS community. Once the 95k USD is scrapped together.
Can someone tell me what version it's running?
I've subscribed to salon for almost a year now and think it is a great deal. For $20 a year you get a lot of content. Lots of stuff for us geeks as well. Look back in the past couple of months and see how many times stories have been links to salon articles and you'll see what I mean. A great site and worth saving.
Can anyone tell me how Gnome 2 will compare with KDE 3? It seems like KDE has been 'ahead' for a while now and if this will even things up for some more.
According to this (from the dot.plan):
June 07 RELEASE - Gnome 2.0 Desktop Release Candidate 1
They are are a week behind schedule.
As far as I know, there is no clause in the GPL that states that whatever project uses GNU components must prepend its name with GNU/ (if such a clause existed then it would not meet the requirements of being 'free' software). Therefore, I think RMS should shut the fuck up. I don't think Linus or anyone is saying that GNU is not an important part of linux. If RMS is sincere about this ridiculous crusade then he should prepend all GNU unix commands with GNU. Want to list files in a directory? GNU/ls. Don't feel like typing that all the time? Well I don't feel like adding it to the beginning of Linux.
Sounds like RMS is trying to take away our freedom to call Linux whatever we want. Personally I would have went with FuckRMSix.
In the end 'A rose by any other name...' and all that.
garrY
Is right here as well as some commentary by those crazy guys here.
I still holding out for the Gamecube to drop. Nothing can compare to nintendo's first party games that will be coming out soon.
yeah, except for the fact that the US PATRIOT act was extrememly popular, supported by the vast majority of americans. That doesn't make it any less stupid, but practically everyone was behind it at the time it was proposed.
Hannibal from Ars Technica has a good commentary on the whole transmeta state of affairs here. Enjoy.
So never then, that's a very long time. I don't really see why we have to wait until we treat humans with dignity before we stop treating animals like in that video.
You say end of story, as if no other argument can possibly refute yours, and then you end your post with a disparaging comment on sweeping generalizations? Nice.
So someone speaks out against PETA gets 4 (insightful), I defend them and get marked as offtopic? We don't need the government to enforce censorship we'll gladly do it ourselve. I've had enough of this, back to work.
Hey,
Fellow geek here. Not only a geek, but a vegan as well. I don't see how making some lame comment about PETA gets to be insightful, but anyways... I invite you to check out these realmedia clips here and here, and tell me that PETA doesn't have a cause worth fighting for.
Personally seeing shit like this makes me forget about how important open source is and focus on more important things.
The new version of Napster will not be using MP3's, it will be using a new proprietary format called .NAP. This will of course include all the rights management feature that you know and love. Why would anyone use this? I have no idea.
As an aside, a service that I would be willing to pay for is My.MP3.com. I loved that service when it was fully operations with ALL my cd's. Since a lot of my CD's have been removed and that it randomly asked to put the cd's in again I find it useless.
I own over 200 CD's and I bought quite a few from listening to music I found off bearshare (and previously Napster). Why don't they get it?
The most effective way to detect steganographic changes is have the original unmodified picture and comparing it bit by bit to the modified one. So if you use this form of encryption modify vacation photos and not well known pictures like the Mona Lisa.
Here is a cool page about using steganography in mp3 files, source and everything.
Good argument. However who is deciding if the help is worth the hurt? It sure ain't me or probably anyone else around here. Ecosystems are very delicate and we are all effected by living in them. I think that it is only right that we citizens have a democratic say in what is done to our surroundings. Personally I don't want to wake up and find my yard covered in Monsanto Super Dandelions(TM). moo.
that if they are going to continue to make trek series (which they are because it is still very profitable) then they should stop making series based on the federation and base it on something more interesting. My suggestion would be the romulans, but that is just my opinion. I think maybe 4 series and numerous movies based on boring "good guy" humans is probably enough. Time to go milk another cash cow.
moo
THis is a game that I would truly love to see. I was positively addicted to the original and was always surprised that a sequel was never made. I enjoyed it more than any incarnation of civilization in fact.
Here is the wired article
I think its dangerous to assume that only those "fascist countries over there" are being monitered, especially after the discovery of Carnivore and even the local police taking part as seen in this article from wired.
Kind of like how university students buy less music, but can't say that napster is the cause of this. High tution costs would obviously have no effect on the amount of music they buy. Funny how the RIAA doesn't see that this argument works both ways.