So there are over 3 times as many Android phones as iPhones, yet internet usage by Android is *lower*?
Something is fishy here.
Is there something fishy about the way the iOS AppStore has more apps than Google Play? Surely if you only look at the marketshare and ignore any other factors then this too would seem bizarre.
Welcome to the old days of the mainframe! You'd need a system that is powerful enough to play multiple instances of the game but also with enough power to encode multiple audio and 1080p video streams, then you need each client to be powerful enough to be able to decode that stream on the fly as well without buffering. That's certainly more effort than it's worth.
Well we've been hearing about how this is a golden opportunity to switch to Linux since there is going to be a re-training cost with Windows 8 anyway, many companies could probably avoid machine upgrades with a switch to Linux as well. So i think it's a legitimate question, a common argument to justify the lack of consumer and corporate adoption of Linux on the desktop has been that people are averse to change (and we've certainly seen that manifest itself as vocal opposition to the start screen) and this is why many people avoid a switch from familiar Windows to unfamiliar Linux, but now it's unfamiliar either way.
So is a whole separate interface, and the two are mostly unaware of one another.
It is a replacement for the start menu, they have the same awareness of eachother as the start menu and desktop do in Windows 95-7.
It's like a free virtualized tablet stapled to Windows 7, which would be forgivable if you weren't forced to switch to the virtualized tablet to launch applications.
How are you 'forced' to switch to it to launch applications? You can't pin them to the taskbar? Or create a desktop shortcut like just about every application asks for when it is installed? How often do you actually use the start menu? I don't really use desktop shortcuts on Windows or OSX, i pin stuff to the dock/taskbar, but anything else i launch by using the search, which means hitting the Windows key in Windows or (Cmd+Space in OSX) and start typing...which of course works the same in 8. I never end up clicking through the start menu to find things, it's far more efficient to type what i'm looking for.
The same can be said about Windows also, newer versions of Windows can't really run on older hardware.
How so? Windows 8 is no more resource-hungry than Windows 7 was and Windows 7 was less resource-hungry than Vista which was released over 5 years ago, which is around the time the first Android phones were released and you sure as hell can't run the latest version on those devices.
Your rambling post ignores the context, this is about EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL and the impact it has on proprietary graphics drivers. The linking is done on the end user's machine when they install the driver module so it would not violate the GPL whether that was EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL or EXPORT_SYMBOL, but since it's the former it won't link at all. This restricts the end user's ability to use software (within the confines of the GPL license) which goes against the intention of the GPL which is to protect and extend freedoms to the end user.
If all BSD software were as complete as TeX, then that argument would be relevant. But given that the vast majority of BSD software (just like software in general) is incomplete, it requires derivative works to be made to be useful.
And derivative works can be made, derivative != proprietary.
Users are not subject to the GPL, since they don't make copies. They are free to combine whatever code they want, including linking (Hell, even copy-pasting) proprietary code directly to GPL code.
Did you even RTFA? You do realise that the GPL is being used to prevent users from using a proprietary module don't you? If you're going to suggest that every end user manually change EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL to EXPORT_SYMBOL and recompile their kernel just to avoid this restriction then you're way out of touch.
The 'freedom' you describe is arbitrarily defined, you can reverse engineer the GPU and write an open source driver if you want, they don't offer an open source driver but if their proprietary driver is so crappy or you don't like the terms under which it is offered then don't use it. You can request that they release and open source driver but it is clearly abuse of freedom and tyrannical to push your ideology on other people especially when you do so by exploiting and restricting the freedom of the end user. Defend in your apologist manner if you like but it is clearly intolerant and absolutist to restrict the user simply because nVidia does not share the GPL ideology.
So? Preventing interoperability on the basis of them not sharing your ideology is only bad for the user.
I'm confused. Which is "them" and which is "your", Nvidia or the kernel devs?
Kernel devs prevent interoperability because nVidia doesn't share their ideology. The kernel code can be kept GPL and the nVidia code can stay proprietary, but the kernel devs want it to ALL be GPL.
Quite obviously, the kernel developers care.
So it's ok for the kernel developers to stop the user from choosing to use proprietary drivers?
They are not eliminating user's freedoms.
Bullshit, they are stopping the user from using proprietary drivers, they are dictating what software the user can run.
Or, it could be argued, the GPL is being used to prevent the device manufacturer from taking away the user's freedom.
Bullshit, you're creating the same logical fallacy that the RIAA and MPAA make when they equate piracy to stealing and use idiotic terms like 'copyright theft', nobody is 'taking away' anything.
The nVidia driver's are buggy security holes (a known fact, there was a recently discovered security hole that nVidia sat on for years without ever bothering to fix), and I wouldn't be surprised to learn that they had code that was designed to prevent me from doing certain things with my computer or even spy on me. They are inimical to my freedom as a user.
So don't use them, that's your choice and it should remain that way, that is not for anyone to choose, not for anyone else to eliminate your freedom of choice. If you're going to make baseless accusations about spying then that's fine, don't use the drivers if you're a conspiracy theorist, but you don't get to make that choice for others, that is simply tyranny in a pathetic attempt at masquerading as 'freedom'.
wrt to 'can only be seen' it is in terms of what the module identifies its license as being. Regardless it is the kernel developers restricting the functionality of the kernel - as far as the end user is concerned - to GPL software as opposed to proprietary software, even though it would not violate the GPL for the user to run said software. It is an attack on the freedom of the user to use the GPL to restrict the choice of the user to run proprietary software.
that is EXACTLY what a license does. It pushes a set of restrictions onto the user as a condition for using the software. ALL licenses do this so they are all ideologically driven. The only exception would be public domain..
Do you understand the difference between permissive and restrictive licenses or not? GPL is not a permissive license - as you suggested - it is a restrictive license.
Wrong, RTFA. It's not about public APIs at all, and you suggesting that means you clearly don't understand the issue at all, instead of using EXPORT_SYMBOL flag they have used the EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL flag so the proprietary driver cannot link with the kernel API on the user's machine.
Given the article that is the topic of this discussion i would think that would be obvious: in this case the GPL is being used to prevent the user from using proprietary drivers.
And that's precisely the problem: it's all destroyed by the middlemen!
BSD code is like a river: the middlemen developers have siphoned it all off and shat in whatever dregs are left before it gets to the end user.
No, derived works don't take anything away, that's analogous to the argument that 'piracy is theft', derivative works don't change the original, they create new copies. I also noticed you've completely avoided the fact that the GPL is being used to restrict freedom of the user, if the code was under a permissive the user wouldn't be restricted in the software they run, but thanks to the GPL, they are!
BSD licensed code infringes upon freedom of the user to modify the software [after a middleman developer created a proprietary derivative work from it]
Wrong, BSD-licensed code does not do that at all. Explain to me how - if i have BSD-licensed code - i am prevented from modifying it? If a proprietary derivative work is created it is not BSD-licensed code, but it does not affect the original BSD-licensed code in any way. So no, it absolutely does not infringe upon anybody's freedom. This use of the GPL does though, even though nvidia is not distributing GPL-licensed code the kernel developers are using the GPL to prevent the user from using the proprietary driver on their own system by not allowing the driver module to link to the GPL code, this is absolutely restricting the freedom of the user.
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So there are over 3 times as many Android phones as iPhones, yet internet usage by Android is *lower*?
Something is fishy here.
Is there something fishy about the way the iOS AppStore has more apps than Google Play? Surely if you only look at the marketshare and ignore any other factors then this too would seem bizarre.
CyanogenMod
Cyanogenmod isn't a version of Android, there are Cyanogenmod distributions based on many different versions of Android.
That means it is good advertising.
Perhaps i should rephrase that...'there isn't any advertising', much less being 'jam packed', the actual content takes up 100% of the screen.
Welcome to the old days of the mainframe! You'd need a system that is powerful enough to play multiple instances of the game but also with enough power to encode multiple audio and 1080p video streams, then you need each client to be powerful enough to be able to decode that stream on the fly as well without buffering. That's certainly more effort than it's worth.
...it's up there with the XBox 360...
It's jam-packed full of advertising, leaving 1/10th of the screen for actual content?
What 'actual content'? When i'm looking at 'actual content' on my xbox i don't see any advertising.
But their OS X client is still the slowest and most bloated software I've ever used.
How is it 'bloated'?
Well we've been hearing about how this is a golden opportunity to switch to Linux since there is going to be a re-training cost with Windows 8 anyway, many companies could probably avoid machine upgrades with a switch to Linux as well. So i think it's a legitimate question, a common argument to justify the lack of consumer and corporate adoption of Linux on the desktop has been that people are averse to change (and we've certainly seen that manifest itself as vocal opposition to the start screen) and this is why many people avoid a switch from familiar Windows to unfamiliar Linux, but now it's unfamiliar either way.
So is a whole separate interface, and the two are mostly unaware of one another.
It is a replacement for the start menu, they have the same awareness of eachother as the start menu and desktop do in Windows 95-7.
It's like a free virtualized tablet stapled to Windows 7, which would be forgivable if you weren't forced to switch to the virtualized tablet to launch applications.
How are you 'forced' to switch to it to launch applications? You can't pin them to the taskbar? Or create a desktop shortcut like just about every application asks for when it is installed?
How often do you actually use the start menu? I don't really use desktop shortcuts on Windows or OSX, i pin stuff to the dock/taskbar, but anything else i launch by using the search, which means hitting the Windows key in Windows or (Cmd+Space in OSX) and start typing...which of course works the same in 8. I never end up clicking through the start menu to find things, it's far more efficient to type what i'm looking for.
well 7 was less resource hungry than Vista too.
Download Puppy, and see if it runs on that Win2K laptop in the back of your closet.
why?
The same can be said about Windows also, newer versions of Windows can't really run on older hardware.
How so? Windows 8 is no more resource-hungry than Windows 7 was and Windows 7 was less resource-hungry than Vista which was released over 5 years ago, which is around the time the first Android phones were released and you sure as hell can't run the latest version on those devices.
I meant 90% of computer uses. Web browser, email client, etc.
Sure 90% of people have that in common but im quite sure 90% of computer users do much more than that and much more varying tasks.
Your rambling post ignores the context, this is about EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL and the impact it has on proprietary graphics drivers. The linking is done on the end user's machine when they install the driver module so it would not violate the GPL whether that was EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL or EXPORT_SYMBOL, but since it's the former it won't link at all. This restricts the end user's ability to use software (within the confines of the GPL license) which goes against the intention of the GPL which is to protect and extend freedoms to the end user.
If all BSD software were as complete as TeX, then that argument would be relevant. But given that the vast majority of BSD software (just like software in general) is incomplete, it requires derivative works to be made to be useful.
And derivative works can be made, derivative != proprietary.
Users are not subject to the GPL, since they don't make copies. They are free to combine whatever code they want, including linking (Hell, even copy-pasting) proprietary code directly to GPL code.
Did you even RTFA? You do realise that the GPL is being used to prevent users from using a proprietary module don't you? If you're going to suggest that every end user manually change EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL to EXPORT_SYMBOL and recompile their kernel just to avoid this restriction then you're way out of touch.
The 'freedom' you describe is arbitrarily defined, you can reverse engineer the GPU and write an open source driver if you want, they don't offer an open source driver but if their proprietary driver is so crappy or you don't like the terms under which it is offered then don't use it. You can request that they release and open source driver but it is clearly abuse of freedom and tyrannical to push your ideology on other people especially when you do so by exploiting and restricting the freedom of the end user. Defend in your apologist manner if you like but it is clearly intolerant and absolutist to restrict the user simply because nVidia does not share the GPL ideology.
Yes he does.
No he doesn't, quite clearly EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL prevents non-GPL modules from calling those functions, or do you not understand what that means?
So? Preventing interoperability on the basis of them not sharing your ideology is only bad for the user.
I'm confused. Which is "them" and which is "your", Nvidia or the kernel devs?
Kernel devs prevent interoperability because nVidia doesn't share their ideology. The kernel code can be kept GPL and the nVidia code can stay proprietary, but the kernel devs want it to ALL be GPL.
Quite obviously, the kernel developers care.
So it's ok for the kernel developers to stop the user from choosing to use proprietary drivers?
They are not eliminating user's freedoms.
Bullshit, they are stopping the user from using proprietary drivers, they are dictating what software the user can run.
Or, it could be argued, the GPL is being used to prevent the device manufacturer from taking away the user's freedom.
Bullshit, you're creating the same logical fallacy that the RIAA and MPAA make when they equate piracy to stealing and use idiotic terms like 'copyright theft', nobody is 'taking away' anything.
The nVidia driver's are buggy security holes (a known fact, there was a recently discovered security hole that nVidia sat on for years without ever bothering to fix), and I wouldn't be surprised to learn that they had code that was designed to prevent me from doing certain things with my computer or even spy on me. They are inimical to my freedom as a user.
So don't use them, that's your choice and it should remain that way, that is not for anyone to choose, not for anyone else to eliminate your freedom of choice. If you're going to make baseless accusations about spying then that's fine, don't use the drivers if you're a conspiracy theorist, but you don't get to make that choice for others, that is simply tyranny in a pathetic attempt at masquerading as 'freedom'.
wrt to 'can only be seen' it is in terms of what the module identifies its license as being. Regardless it is the kernel developers restricting the functionality of the kernel - as far as the end user is concerned - to GPL software as opposed to proprietary software, even though it would not violate the GPL for the user to run said software. It is an attack on the freedom of the user to use the GPL to restrict the choice of the user to run proprietary software.
that is EXACTLY what a license does. It pushes a set of restrictions onto the user as a condition for using the software. ALL licenses do this so they are all ideologically driven. The only exception would be public domain..
Do you understand the difference between permissive and restrictive licenses or not? GPL is not a permissive license - as you suggested - it is a restrictive license.
Wrong, RTFA. It's not about public APIs at all, and you suggesting that means you clearly don't understand the issue at all, instead of using EXPORT_SYMBOL flag they have used the EXPORT_SYMBOL_GPL flag so the proprietary driver cannot link with the kernel API on the user's machine.
Given the article that is the topic of this discussion i would think that would be obvious: in this case the GPL is being used to prevent the user from using proprietary drivers.
And that's precisely the problem: it's all destroyed by the middlemen!
BSD code is like a river: the middlemen developers have siphoned it all off and shat in whatever dregs are left before it gets to the end user.
No, derived works don't take anything away, that's analogous to the argument that 'piracy is theft', derivative works don't change the original, they create new copies. I also noticed you've completely avoided the fact that the GPL is being used to restrict freedom of the user, if the code was under a permissive the user wouldn't be restricted in the software they run, but thanks to the GPL, they are!
Nobody can 'close code up'.
BSD licensed code infringes upon freedom of the user to modify the software [after a middleman developer created a proprietary derivative work from it]
Wrong, BSD-licensed code does not do that at all. Explain to me how - if i have BSD-licensed code - i am prevented from modifying it? If a proprietary derivative work is created it is not BSD-licensed code, but it does not affect the original BSD-licensed code in any way. So no, it absolutely does not infringe upon anybody's freedom.
This use of the GPL does though, even though nvidia is not distributing GPL-licensed code the kernel developers are using the GPL to prevent the user from using the proprietary driver on their own system by not allowing the driver module to link to the GPL code, this is absolutely restricting the freedom of the user.