I'm in the same position that you are but the reality is that we are in a very small demographic. The simple fact that we consider "trying" other OS's, or running multiple OS's underscores the fact. When the average consumer, and maybe even the average "prosumer" looks to buy a computer, they look at the entire package. There are few linux packages out there, and none that are nearly as compelling as the PC and Apple offerings (unless your budget is $300).
Do some research on technology standards (eg: the ECMA and ISO). These standards bodies exist to allow companies to hold on to their IP (eg: patents) while allowing the community to implement said standards w/o worrying about licensing, etc.
Some people withing Sun seem to be scared though that an Open-Source Java standard could be "polluted" by Microsoft.
Hah - that's a good one! The issue within Sun is that they can't collect on the Java license of it goes OSS. This is why there's still issues with projects like Tomcat and JBoss. Until Sun makes Java an open standard (ECMA, ISO, etc.), I don't see how an "open Java" can truely exist.
it's still letting certain people pay to break the rules.
You mean just like our speeding ticket system? If a MS exec making $200K+/year get's caught speeding the $180 ticket was more than worth the experience for him. However, if a UW college student get's the same ticket, it's going to cost him $300+ to pay it off because it'll go on a high-interest credit card.
So, unless you advocate a progressive tax and progressive fine system (as I do), than you can't complain about the government ebaying the HOV lanes.
Microsoft was convicted of abusing their monopoly in a few specific ways (eg: Strong Arming Dell ensuring that BeOS didn't get put on machines). So, therefore, they are a corporation convicted of breaking a law, not having a monopoly.
...isn't it OK to refer to him/her as a convicted mechanic
It's quite a stretch and this choice of language is up for interpretation. Saying a "convicted mechanic" can be rendered as "that person was convicted of being a mechanic" - as if being a mechanic was illegal. That's my problem with the verbage. I'd rather refer to MS as being convicted of abusing a monopoly - because that's what they did. They fairly obtained, and in many ways maintained (sans the findings of fact by the DOJ) their monopoly. Therefore their monopoly is not illegal, and any - even slight - insinuation is innacruate.
*sigh*, this is getting redundant. Being a Monopoly is not illegal, therefore you can be a "convicted monopolist". It's like saying that Apple is a "convicted corporation".
But a Ferrari significantly outperforms a Ford Mustang, whereas PC's outperform (performance per dollar wise) an Apple. So, for Dad who just wants a computer that "works", the premium for Apple is legit. However, for me who want's performance for the dollar, you can't beat the "beige box". And no, I'm not sacrificing stability as long as I buy decent parts. If I bought cheap "gunna crash or cause problems" parts then we're talking ~$250.
In this case, the GPL is exactly the same as the BSD license... The GPL does not allow people to stand on the shoulders of giants without a return in contribution.
Wrong - the software has already been paid for by my tax dollars. If I want to modify it and not "give back" to the government, I should have every right to. Government created software should be BSD'd (or the like).
Finally, as long as I don't make any modifications and distribute those modifications I don't have to return for my contribution. This is the #1 problem I have with OSS - Microsoft can take the hard works of many, use it internally to increase efficiencies (say an Intranet app of some sort), and effectively profit off of my work, without me seeing a dime. No thanks!
GPL only says that you should allow anyone that got binaries from you to get the source code as well.
What about government contracters that need access to some libraries in which you don't want to give them access to the source. Sure, binaries can be disassembled (esp. Java and.NET), but obfuscation can help deter that threat. Also, what about employees internally. As far as the GPL is concerned, if they have access to the binaries, they can legally obtain the source and redistribute it, or even sell it.
I've always contended that any software that the government develops should be open source via a BSD(ish) license as long as that software is not military related and/or does not contain sensative information. However, the government purchasing or using existing OSS (esp. GPL'd and less so LGPL'd) is a little different. At best it warrents caution.
You can charge for writting it. Most software in use is special purpose. It actually makes sense for a customer to want his program to be gpled, he is not dependant on the original supplier for later upgrades.
This has nothing to do with open source. I write special purpose software exclusively. My clients buy the source - they are not dependant on my company to make changes (although they can hire us to do so). GPLing it just means that our company can just take the source and give it away - in most all cases this is a bad thing because our clients to not want the competition to have what they just spent big bucks developing.
BCentral can definitely be used for spam. It's not all opt-in because a customer can buy a list from just about anywhere. However, AFAIK, the TOC state that you must only use opt-in lists. I once worked for a company that emailed previous customers about a new product. Technically not spam because these customers gave us their email address, but it's still junk mail.
It's amazing how while suing spammers and getting all the good PR, MS is also blocking anti-spam legislation.
Because it's not as simple as "anti-spam" legislation. No to pieces of legislation (even if they're within the same category) are the same (duh?). Just read the spam laws in WA, vs. the laws they're trying to block in CA. MS didn't try to block WA's laws.
This would be true if MS was saying that it was unfair. They're not. They're just saying there's no point in competing on a 0 profit project, esp. when they're competing at a disadvantage. It's a great business strategy to build an OS and use it to further other products. Apple is doing this. MS can only do this in a very limited fashion now that they have a monopoly. Nevertheless, smart on Apple's part, smart on MS's part. Apple gets a superior browser, and MS stops wasting money developing a product that no one will use.
IE has no potential to make money for MS on the Apple platform, so why would they continue it? XBox has the potential of profiting, and already drives profit for other departments (eg: Microsoft Games). Many business ventures have a 3-5year loss time, where no profit is made. IE has been around for a while, it's a commodity, and it's really not a product like it used to be when web browsers were a novelity. It's kind of like calling Explorer (the Windows file manager shell, not IE) a product and then making one on a competing OS. It just doesn't make sense.
How many christians are raised in the church but don't curently practice?
Than they aren't a Christian. It's improper to assume that just because someone goes to church (Catholic or Protestant) that they are a Christian - period.
How is a catholic not a christian?
A Christian is merely someone who attempts to follow Christ - it's not a religion in and of itself (although it's improperly defined as one many times). The Catholic church has a lot of people who worship Religion (read: Religiosity), the saints, Mary, the Pope etc. None of this has to do with Christ. So, although many Catholics follow Christ and are therefore Christians, being a practicing Catholic does not make you a Christian.
There are two reasons why I don't agree with that larger number.
A) Many people are "raised in the Catholic Church", and therefore consider themselves Catholic. This doesn't mean that they are currently practicing the religion.
B) Partly because of (A), but not exclusive to, not all Catholics are Christians even though officially as a religion they are considered Christians.
I think it's difficult for a survey to determine how many Christians are truely Catholic, and how many Catholics are truely Christians. For the time being I'd rather rely on my anecdotes.
We all know that MS is good at copying, but poor at actually 'innovating'.
Ironically, the reverse is usually true for OSS.
No, OSS tries to copy, but doesn't always copy well (Read: still working on a good unix desktop. See Also: Apple for innovation in this area). I've also never seen OSS innovate beyond simple improvements to what OSS copied.
Microsoft, on the other hand, takes an idea and figures out how to make it work for a mass market. It may not be drastic innovation but rather subtle but important improvements (eg:.NET sans cross-platform support), but in others (like DirectX) they are best-of-breed.
Unfortunately, religion (namely islam) created the economic and repressive region that the middle east is struggling to get out of (admittedly, Egypt is far ahead with a semi-secular government). If it wasn't for the religious intolerance of that region, maybe the middle east would still be ahead in the areas of science and medicine. Heck, if it wasn't for the oil in the land I'm not sure what the middle east would have at this point. And for the record, my Dad was born in Cairo, and I am very proud of my Egyption heritage (I'm about 1/4th Egyption). But I'm emberassed as to what happened to our region within the last century or so. So yes, our pyramids are great, we had an airspace program way before anyone in the west even dreamed about it, but why do we still take financial aid from America?
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and Mac OS also has a niche
Ya, the "making slick computers that just work and are userfriendly for the average and power users" niche.
Just because Apple has a small marketshare doesn't mean that it has a niche. They appeal to the vast majority of Windows' market.
I'm in the same position that you are but the reality is that we are in a very small demographic. The simple fact that we consider "trying" other OS's, or running multiple OS's underscores the fact. When the average consumer, and maybe even the average "prosumer" looks to buy a computer, they look at the entire package. There are few linux packages out there, and none that are nearly as compelling as the PC and Apple offerings (unless your budget is $300).
Do some research on technology standards (eg: the ECMA and ISO). These standards bodies exist to allow companies to hold on to their IP (eg: patents) while allowing the community to implement said standards w/o worrying about licensing, etc.
Some people withing Sun seem to be scared though that an Open-Source Java standard could be "polluted" by Microsoft.
Hah - that's a good one! The issue within Sun is that they can't collect on the Java license of it goes OSS. This is why there's still issues with projects like Tomcat and JBoss. Until Sun makes Java an open standard (ECMA, ISO, etc.), I don't see how an "open Java" can truely exist.
Possibly because the roads are public property
Exactly, and the money is going to the public.
it's still letting certain people pay to break the rules.
You mean just like our speeding ticket system? If a MS exec making $200K+/year get's caught speeding the $180 ticket was more than worth the experience for him. However, if a UW college student get's the same ticket, it's going to cost him $300+ to pay it off because it'll go on a high-interest credit card.
So, unless you advocate a progressive tax and progressive fine system (as I do), than you can't complain about the government ebaying the HOV lanes.
Microsoft was convicted of abusing their monopoly in a few specific ways (eg: Strong Arming Dell ensuring that BeOS didn't get put on machines). So, therefore, they are a corporation convicted of breaking a law, not having a monopoly.
...isn't it OK to refer to him/her as a convicted mechanic
It's quite a stretch and this choice of language is up for interpretation. Saying a "convicted mechanic" can be rendered as "that person was convicted of being a mechanic" - as if being a mechanic was illegal. That's my problem with the verbage. I'd rather refer to MS as being convicted of abusing a monopoly - because that's what they did. They fairly obtained, and in many ways maintained (sans the findings of fact by the DOJ) their monopoly. Therefore their monopoly is not illegal, and any - even slight - insinuation is innacruate.
Ya they just don't trust you to run it on 3rd party hardware - makes it a lot easier to prevent pirating.
*sigh*, this is getting redundant. Being a Monopoly is not illegal, therefore you can be a "convicted monopolist". It's like saying that Apple is a "convicted corporation".
But a Ferrari significantly outperforms a Ford Mustang, whereas PC's outperform (performance per dollar wise) an Apple. So, for Dad who just wants a computer that "works", the premium for Apple is legit. However, for me who want's performance for the dollar, you can't beat the "beige box". And no, I'm not sacrificing stability as long as I buy decent parts. If I bought cheap "gunna crash or cause problems" parts then we're talking ~$250.
there is no requirement to share your modifications to gpl code if you're not redistributing it outside your organization
True, but AFAIK, it's perfectly legal for one of the developers to take some of that code home. That can be a very bad thing.
In this case, the GPL is exactly the same as the BSD license... The GPL does not allow people to stand on the shoulders of giants without a return in contribution.
Wrong - the software has already been paid for by my tax dollars. If I want to modify it and not "give back" to the government, I should have every right to. Government created software should be BSD'd (or the like).
Finally, as long as I don't make any modifications and distribute those modifications I don't have to return for my contribution. This is the #1 problem I have with OSS - Microsoft can take the hard works of many, use it internally to increase efficiencies (say an Intranet app of some sort), and effectively profit off of my work, without me seeing a dime. No thanks!
GPL only says that you should allow anyone that got binaries from you to get the source code as well.
.NET), but obfuscation can help deter that threat. Also, what about employees internally. As far as the GPL is concerned, if they have access to the binaries, they can legally obtain the source and redistribute it, or even sell it.
What about government contracters that need access to some libraries in which you don't want to give them access to the source. Sure, binaries can be disassembled (esp. Java and
I've always contended that any software that the government develops should be open source via a BSD(ish) license as long as that software is not military related and/or does not contain sensative information. However, the government purchasing or using existing OSS (esp. GPL'd and less so LGPL'd) is a little different. At best it warrents caution.
You can charge for writting it.
Most software in use is special purpose.
It actually makes sense for a customer to want his program to be gpled, he is not dependant on the original supplier for later upgrades.
This has nothing to do with open source. I write special purpose software exclusively. My clients buy the source - they are not dependant on my company to make changes (although they can hire us to do so). GPLing it just means that our company can just take the source and give it away - in most all cases this is a bad thing because our clients to not want the competition to have what they just spent big bucks developing.
BCentral can definitely be used for spam. It's not all opt-in because a customer can buy a list from just about anywhere. However, AFAIK, the TOC state that you must only use opt-in lists. I once worked for a company that emailed previous customers about a new product. Technically not spam because these customers gave us their email address, but it's still junk mail.
You make a fair point, but the good press will be worth it's weight in gold, which I'm sure is what Microsoft is thinking.
Or maybe they run a large ISP in which spam clogs their mail servers (costing them money) and annoys their customers.
It's amazing how while suing spammers and getting all the good PR, MS is
also blocking anti-spam legislation.
Because it's not as simple as "anti-spam" legislation. No to pieces of legislation (even if they're within the same category) are the same (duh?). Just read the spam laws in WA, vs. the laws they're trying to block in CA. MS didn't try to block WA's laws.
Pot. Kettle. Black.
This would be true if MS was saying that it was unfair. They're not. They're just saying there's no point in competing on a 0 profit project, esp. when they're competing at a disadvantage. It's a great business strategy to build an OS and use it to further other products. Apple is doing this. MS can only do this in a very limited fashion now that they have a monopoly. Nevertheless, smart on Apple's part, smart on MS's part. Apple gets a superior browser, and MS stops wasting money developing a product that no one will use.
IE has no potential to make money for MS on the Apple platform, so why would they continue it? XBox has the potential of profiting, and already drives profit for other departments (eg: Microsoft Games). Many business ventures have a 3-5year loss time, where no profit is made. IE has been around for a while, it's a commodity, and it's really not a product like it used to be when web browsers were a novelity. It's kind of like calling Explorer (the Windows file manager shell, not IE) a product and then making one on a competing OS. It just doesn't make sense.
They'll Kill Off anything that doesn't make them money. Remember, they're ruthless business people...
Any business worth even 1/4th it's value on wallstreet does this.
How many christians are raised in the church but don't curently practice?
Than they aren't a Christian. It's improper to assume that just because someone goes to church (Catholic or Protestant) that they are a Christian - period.
How is a catholic not a christian?
A Christian is merely someone who attempts to follow Christ - it's not a religion in and of itself (although it's improperly defined as one many times). The Catholic church has a lot of people who worship Religion (read: Religiosity), the saints, Mary, the Pope etc. None of this has to do with Christ. So, although many Catholics follow Christ and are therefore Christians, being a practicing Catholic does not make you a Christian.
There are two reasons why I don't agree with that larger number.
A) Many people are "raised in the Catholic Church", and therefore consider themselves Catholic. This doesn't mean that they are currently practicing the religion.
B) Partly because of (A), but not exclusive to, not all Catholics are Christians even though officially as a religion they are considered Christians.
I think it's difficult for a survey to determine how many Christians are truely Catholic, and how many Catholics are truely Christians. For the time being I'd rather rely on my anecdotes.
Microsoft is a convicted monopolist
For the 200th time, no, they are not. They were convicted, in very specific instances, of abusing a legitimately obtained monopoly.
We all know that MS is good at copying, but poor at actually 'innovating'.
.NET sans cross-platform support), but in others (like DirectX) they are best-of-breed.
Ironically, the reverse is usually true for OSS.
No, OSS tries to copy, but doesn't always copy well (Read: still working on a good unix desktop. See Also: Apple for innovation in this area). I've also never seen OSS innovate beyond simple improvements to what OSS copied.
Microsoft, on the other hand, takes an idea and figures out how to make it work for a mass market. It may not be drastic innovation but rather subtle but important improvements (eg:
Unfortunately, religion (namely islam) created the economic and repressive region that the middle east is struggling to get out of (admittedly, Egypt is far ahead with a semi-secular government). If it wasn't for the religious intolerance of that region, maybe the middle east would still be ahead in the areas of science and medicine. Heck, if it wasn't for the oil in the land I'm not sure what the middle east would have at this point. And for the record, my Dad was born in Cairo, and I am very proud of my Egyption heritage (I'm about 1/4th Egyption). But I'm emberassed as to what happened to our region within the last century or so. So yes, our pyramids are great, we had an airspace program way before anyone in the west even dreamed about it, but why do we still take financial aid from America?