You're kidding right? Either that is one whopper of a troll, or you are a wannabe audiophile. *REAL* audiophiles would NEVER use those phrases.
That, and the compositions of Rachmoninoff aren't exactly sonically varied.
If you had put Schoenberg, Mahler or Shostakovich you would have had a little credibility. But Rachmoninoff?
If you are serious, go back and do an actual double blind test (something even real audiophiles have problems doing), then say you can 1) tell the difference between 256k mp3 and 256k ogg AND 2) conclusively say that ogg is worse.
Others who HAVE done this have reached completely different conclusions.
The drives fail after about a year on average. We are not using udrives in our product because of this. Its great as disposable media, and a great display of technology, but they're not quite ready for prime time.
For all your condescending posturing you still seem incapable of understanding his point. Arguing over how a dictionary defines a term is a piss poor way of debating a point and convincing anybody you have anything valid to say.
We *all* know why stealing is wrong. It deprives the victim of something that is "his".
Everything else, including the law, legal definitions and semantic origins of the word "steal" follow from THIS, not the other way around.
Go back, and argue about why copying information is illegal (and, optionally, morally wrong) w/o resorting to your lame pendantic handwringing over who can use merriamwebster.com faster.
.. for not being able to follow his simple point. If "depriving" somebody of "potential revenue" is theft (which is what clueless trolls like you like to claim), then simply competing in a free market is also theft. Reducto ad absurdum.
Catch on yet, or forget to take your medication again?
I thought/. was a REAL news source! How unprofessional! They didn't bother to do any fact checking on this story... I found out through a friend that Santa doesn't actually exist.
Truthfully, I was nodding when I read your original post. Our founding fathers had the luxury to flee to a completely new continent (albiet one populated by some pesky indigenous peoples that needed wiping out). We, however, have no such luxury. When people say idiotic things like "love it or leave it" they don't think to ask "leave for where?"
Another continent ruled by ogilarchy and the same corporations as every where else? Bummer.
Why is it that, when it's the Government's word versus some cracker's, everyone always wants to believe the cracker? Doesn't the Justice Department have a lot more to lose by lying about this?
No. This is business as usual for a PR agency (government or otherwise). This is what PR agencies do (government or otherwise). It is INDIVIDUALS who have most to lose if they make the slightest mistep. Lives and families have been trashed over much less, but corporations and government institutions do it daily, and nobody really cares.
Hell, the PURPOSE of a corporation is to protect member individuals from the law, much like what happens in a government institution, where there are multitudes of ways (yes, even legal ones) to CYA.
ACtually, perhaps instead of donating to the EFF we should be donating to a marketing fund to hire an ad agency to come up with/. slogans and musical jingles for all the hot button issues;)
I'm thinking maybe something along the lines of NRA-type "guns don't kill people, people kill people" stuff.
DMCA - G. Orwell's thought control police state sooner than you think.
CNNTimeWarnerAolTurnerMSNBC - for those of us who don't have time for news that doesn't entertain!
Intellectual property: Honk if you love monopolies!
Microsoft: Stifling innovation with our own MSInnovation(TM) since 1975!
Dragging and dropping is better than rsync, because with rsync you have to know and type out the name of the directory ahead of time. GUIs provide a nice spatial representation of the directory structure, and are very quick to scan and find.
Do you even KNOW what rsync is used for? Hint: its not a replacement for cp -a. You need learn a bit more about what rsync actually does.
rsync features
rsync is a file transfer program for Unix systems. rsync uses the "rsync algorithm" which provides a very fast method for bringing remote files into sync. It does this by sending just the differences in the files across the link, without requiring that both sets of files are present at one of the ends of the link beforehand.
Some features of rsync include
can update whole directory trees and filesystems
optionally preserves symbolic links, hard links, file ownership, permissions, devices and times
requires no special privilages to install
internal pipelining reduces latency for multiple files
can use rsh, ssh or direct sockets as the transport
supports anonymous rsync which is ideal for mirroring
There are about a million other features your GUI can't even come CLOSE to implementing w/o a maze of tabbed options menus. Fortunately for me, I am capable of LEARNING how to use the tool so I can whip out a one liner in a few seconds that does EXACTLY what I want, every time.
GUIs are great for tasks you only do a few times (or need to learn how to do quickly), but as a front end to a general purpose utility, they simply don't match up to what a CLI can do.
The whole point to having a regular contributor to/. is to spur not only debate but action. Since nobody takes Katz seriously, all that results from his writings is debate (and usually not very insightful debate at that). Maybe somebody like Lessig can help crystallize the/. community into getting real grassroots political leverage.
Personally, I'm doubtful - too many of us are frustrated, cynical, jaded, and face it, just plain lazy (myself included). We feel powerless and disenfranchised so not only do we stew in apathy, but we also express views which remain inaccessible and incomprehensible to the type of optimistic, motivated people who form the base of a successful movement.
We need somebody who can translate our whining into clever 30 second sound bytes for mass consumption. And there is NO way Katz is up to that. Maybe Lessig is.
The idea that "unbiased" journalism is somehow superior is simply wrong. Not because being unbiased is inherently wrong (its not; the opposite is true, being unbiases is always superior), but because there simply is no such thing as "unbiased" journalism.
I don't know about you, but by FAR the reporting that holds value for me is the kind where the bias is KNOWN. Ever see "The Insider"? Wouldn't you like to know if there is bias mucking with your news organization?
You are living in a DREAM world if you think your news organizations are giving you unfiltered, unbiased news.
... nor did I claim that all MS products are garbage.
I clearly stated that for OUR applications, a variety of different OS's met our needs. Not just Linux, but also PSOS/VxWorks/Nucleus. I also clearly stated that Linux has several weaknesses, most notably RT requirements (which several groups are working on as we speak) and relatively large footprint (compared to some of the VERY small OS's). One thing I will say is that MS does NOT currently make any embedded products that meet our requirements, and they are unlikely to in the future.
Now, while we may be talking about embedded systems, realize that there are embedded system companies that have to make their systems work as seamlessly as possible with what their clients have lying about as well.
Cripes, is there anthing in your post that is accurate? I almost missed this gem.
While MS products ARE engineered to work well with other MS products, MS also spends most of its time trying to figure out now NOT to interoperate with other vendors whenever possible. Everybody else (other than MS) is aiming to interoperate with everybody else (including MS). Now, tell me again, if interoperability is a requirment, why I should choose MS?
.. how effective a completely content-free marketing campaign can be. I didn't mean to offend, it just rankles when people base their opinions on what they see on TV and not what their experience tells them.
You just validated Microsoft's arguments with your third point: no plethora of drivers. No matter how fancy Linux has gotten, it still hasn't been able to interface with the huge base of hardware that Microsoft products can. There are a lot of companies that cannot afford fancy new hardware; they must make do on something that was brought in years ago. And Microsoft products play nice with them.
You are smoking crack, son.
Have you actually DONE any embedded work? I have. With PSOS, VxWorks, and Nucleus. On several different processors (AMD29k, i960, M68k, and PPC). With SEVERAL different PCI bridges, chipsets, memory controllers, network interfaces, uarts, and DMA controllers. NONE of which are supported by Microsoft, and NONE of which are unilaterally supported by the OS's we have used. Guess which OS does?
As for support, I would much rather have a big, rich company supporting my software than a bunch of chatrooms. If my system is compromised or causes damage, I want to be able to say, "This company here is responsible for it"
Good for you. All you have proven to me is that you are evasive, slime sucking, scum who LOVES to point fingers and blame somebody else for your problems. *I* would rather have the source code and access to the original author, so that if there IS a problem, I can tell my boss we can a) sack up like men and take responsibility and b) fix it, not hide like good corporate lackeys.
I would not be surprised if XP was better than Linux in alot of aspects for embedded systems, since MS has focused alot more effort towards it.
Do you have ANY real evidence of this other than your perusal of Microsoft's marketing materials? Spend some time in the trenches doing actual work, and less time reading the trade rags, and you might BEGIN to get a clue.
There are hundreds of developers WORLD WIDE who are working hard at building embedded linux devices - and thanks to the GPL they are working cooperatively, and not wasting time re-inventing the wheel.
Have you actually ever worked with any embedded OS's? Vendors LOVE to sell you their OTHER customers code! I don't know about you, but if i needed a driver for a whizbang6583k chip, I would rather talk to the author than a vendor who simply repackaged somebody elses (old) code and sold it to me. Now picture dozens of customers, all fixing the SAME bugs in this whizbang6583k chip, but not knowing that the bugs have already been addressed?
I have done porting work with just about every single embedded OS (some predating windows CE by about a decade). I have built/tested/deployed i960 and AMD29k boards using psos, m68k boards using vxworks, and ppc boards using nucleus, all in house, from scratch. You, sir, apparently have done NONE of those, because if you did, you would know that porting Linux is no different. We did it for three different ppc boards, also in house. The process was no different from developing a BSP for any of the other commercial vendor products. The difference is that Linux 1) is a real OS (even if it is lacking in the RT arena still) 2) no rediculous per unit royalty fees 3) free tools 4) portable tools (i.e. can cross compile from whatever platform I like) 5) rediculously stable 6) HUGE driver support (with source - something the commercial vendors love to nickle-dime you for, btw) 7) a large software library (e.g. just about every useful UNIX app exists in one form another) 8) excellent support via source code, email-lists, and irc. (Yes, the "linux has no support" meme is complete FUD - have you ever tried to negotiate WindRiver's support dept. even WITH a fully paid up support contract?)
The fact that MS has been "doing embedded versions" since the mid (try late) 90's is completely irrelevant. There are a ton of crappy, buggy, useless products that still exist today that their vendors have been "doing" for a lot longer. What makes you think that just because they are old that they don't suck?
How exactly is forcing him to rat out his boss in return for being let out of jail (where he has been rotting for months, by your OWN admission) correcting a mistake?
Has anybody thought of using IP laws themselves as a tool to regulate Microsoft? For example, one could choose to selectively enforce their patent or copyright claims.
Considering that it is the *government's* IP laws that help make Microsoft a monopoly in the first place, wouldn't it make sense to start "breaking" their monopoly their?
Here was a PERFECT opportunity to use an open source model, and instead Bill sent everybody bigfoot letters.
Perhaps you are too young to grasp the hobbiest climate at the time. There were a few dozen hackers (tops) playing with the Altair when it was released. Why? It was expensive, bulky, and basically useless. The only people playing with this device were freaks and geeks who enjoyed the challenge of a new (useless gadget). We are NOT talking about a consumer device needing software for the masses.
BillG did NOT stand to lose ANY money from people "stealing" his prized code (and there is evidence that it wasn't even Bill's code... Paul Allen allegedly did most of the work.. it was up to Bill to take care of the "business" side). We are talking a miniscule market here - say, 20 people, optimistically.
The Altair in general would have benefitted greatly from a COOPERATIVE effort, something that BillG was (and still is) incapable of comprehending. In his twisted, narcissistic, self-absorbed mind, all he can see are profit margins. This single letter completely decimated the Altair as a platform, and most hobbiests threw up their hands in utter disgust of BillG's sickening strong arm tactics.
Anybody who buys Bill's rediculous assertion that he created Open Source needs a severe beating with a clue stick.
History lesson: Bill's first reaction to an "Open Source" effort was the following (infamous) letter:
An Open Letter to Hobbyists
To me, the most critical thing in the hobby market right now is the lack of good software courses, books and software itself. Without good software and an owner who understands programming, a hobby computer is wasted. Will quality software be written for the hobby market
Almost a year ago, Paul Allen and myself, expecting the hobby market to expand, hired Monte Davidoff and developed Altair BASIC. Though the initial work took only two months, the three of us have spent most of the last year documenting, improving and adding features to BASIC. Now we have 4K, 8K, EXTENDED, ROM and DISK BASIC. The value of the computer time we have used exceeds $40,000.
The feedback we have gotten from the hundreds of people who say they are using BASIC has all been positive. Two surprising things are apparent, however, 1) Most of these "users" never bought BASIC (less than 10% of all Altair owners have bought BASIC), and 2) The amount of royalties we have received from sales to hobbyists makes the time spent on Altair BASIC worth less than $2 an hour.
Why is this? As the majority of hobbyists must be aware, most of you steal your software. Hardware must be paid for, but software is something to share. Who cares if the people who worked on it get paid?
Is this fair? One thing you don't do by stealing software is get back at MITS for some problem you may have had. MITS doesn't make money selling software. The royalty paid to us, the manual, the tape and the overhead make it a break-even operation. One thing you do do is prevent good software from being written. Who can afford to do professional work for nothing? What hobbyist can put 3-man years into programming, finding all bugs, documenting his product and distribute for free? The fact is, no one besides us has invested a lot of money in hobby software. We have written 6800 BASIC, and are writing 8080 APL and 6800 APL, but there is very little incentive to make this software available to hobbyists. Most directly, the thing you do is theft.
What about the guys who re-sell Altair BASIC, aren't they making money on hobby software? Yes, but those who have been reported to us may lose in the end. They are the ones who give hobbyists a bad name, and should be kicked out of any club meeting they show up at.
I would appreciate letters from any one who wants to pay up, or has a suggestion or comment. Just write to me at 1180 Alvarado SE, #114, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 87108. Nothing would please me more than being able to hire ten programmers and deluge the hobby market with good software.
Bill Gates
General Partner, Micro-Soft
What a ringing endorsement of the principals of Open Source.
Why am I not suprised that Cringley is ignorant of this letter?
Slashdot Mirror
You're kidding right? Either that is one whopper of a troll, or you are a wannabe audiophile. *REAL* audiophiles would NEVER use those phrases.
That, and the compositions of Rachmoninoff aren't exactly sonically varied.
If you had put Schoenberg, Mahler or Shostakovich you would have had a little credibility. But Rachmoninoff?
If you are serious, go back and do an actual double blind test (something even real audiophiles have problems doing), then say you can 1) tell the difference between 256k mp3 and 256k ogg AND 2) conclusively say that ogg is worse.
Others who HAVE done this have reached completely different conclusions.
The drives fail after about a year on average. We are not using udrives in our product because of this. Its great as disposable media, and a great display of technology, but they're not quite ready for prime time.
For all your condescending posturing you still seem incapable of understanding his point. Arguing over how a dictionary defines a term is a piss poor way of debating a point and convincing anybody you have anything valid to say.
We *all* know why stealing is wrong. It deprives the victim of something that is "his".
Everything else, including the law, legal definitions and semantic origins of the word "steal" follow from THIS, not the other way around.
Go back, and argue about why copying information is illegal (and, optionally, morally wrong) w/o resorting to your lame pendantic handwringing over who can use merriamwebster.com faster.
.. for not being able to follow his simple point. If "depriving" somebody of "potential revenue" is theft (which is what clueless trolls like you like to claim), then simply competing in a free market is also theft. Reducto ad absurdum.
Catch on yet, or forget to take your medication again?
I thought /. was a REAL news source! How unprofessional! They didn't bother to do any fact checking on this story... I found out through a friend that Santa doesn't actually exist.
Shame on you.
Truthfully, I was nodding when I read your original post. Our founding fathers had the luxury to flee to a completely new continent (albiet one populated by some pesky indigenous peoples that needed wiping out). We, however, have no such luxury. When people say idiotic things like "love it or leave it" they don't think to ask "leave for where?"
Another continent ruled by ogilarchy and the same corporations as every where else? Bummer.
Sorry, he got modded down to -1. Wasn't flaming you.
... because I would like some fries with that, and no, to answer you question, I don't want to super size it for $0.29 more.
Oh, and did you ever finish that GED or get the hitch to your trailer home fixed?
Why is it that, when it's the Government's word versus some cracker's, everyone always wants to believe the cracker? Doesn't the Justice Department have a lot more to lose by lying about this?
No. This is business as usual for a PR agency (government or otherwise). This is what PR agencies do (government or otherwise). It is INDIVIDUALS who have most to lose if they make the slightest mistep. Lives and families have been trashed over much less, but corporations and government institutions do it daily, and nobody really cares.
Hell, the PURPOSE of a corporation is to protect member individuals from the law, much like what happens in a government institution, where there are multitudes of ways (yes, even legal ones) to CYA.
I'm thinking maybe something along the lines of NRA-type "guns don't kill people, people kill people" stuff.
DMCA - G. Orwell's thought control police state sooner than you think.
CNNTimeWarnerAolTurnerMSNBC - for those of us who don't have time for news that doesn't entertain!
Intellectual property: Honk if you love monopolies!
Microsoft: Stifling innovation with our own MSInnovation(TM) since 1975!
Do you even KNOW what rsync is used for? Hint: its not a replacement for cp -a. You need learn a bit more about what rsync actually does.
From the features list on rsync.samba.org:
rsync features
rsync is a file transfer program for Unix systems. rsync uses the "rsync algorithm" which provides a very fast method for bringing remote files into sync. It does this by sending just the differences in the files across the link, without requiring that both sets of files are present at one of the ends of the link beforehand.
Some features of rsync include
can update whole directory trees and filesystems
optionally preserves symbolic links, hard links, file ownership, permissions, devices and times
requires no special privilages to install
internal pipelining reduces latency for multiple files
can use rsh, ssh or direct sockets as the transport
supports anonymous rsync which is ideal for mirroring
There are about a million other features your GUI can't even come CLOSE to implementing w/o a maze of tabbed options menus. Fortunately for me, I am capable of LEARNING how to use the tool so I can whip out a one liner in a few seconds that does EXACTLY what I want, every time.
GUIs are great for tasks you only do a few times (or need to learn how to do quickly), but as a front end to a general purpose utility, they simply don't match up to what a CLI can do.
The whole point to having a regular contributor to /. is to spur not only debate but action. Since nobody takes Katz seriously, all that results from his writings is debate (and usually not very insightful debate at that). Maybe somebody like Lessig can help crystallize the /. community into getting real grassroots political leverage.
Personally, I'm doubtful - too many of us are frustrated, cynical, jaded, and face it, just plain lazy (myself included). We feel powerless and disenfranchised so not only do we stew in apathy, but we also express views which remain inaccessible and incomprehensible to the type of optimistic, motivated people who form the base of a successful movement.
We need somebody who can translate our whining into clever 30 second sound bytes for mass consumption. And there is NO way Katz is up to that. Maybe Lessig is.
The idea that "unbiased" journalism is somehow superior is simply wrong. Not because being unbiased is inherently wrong (its not; the opposite is true, being unbiases is always superior), but because there simply is no such thing as "unbiased" journalism.
I don't know about you, but by FAR the reporting that holds value for me is the kind where the bias is KNOWN. Ever see "The Insider"? Wouldn't you like to know if there is bias mucking with your news organization?
You are living in a DREAM world if you think your news organizations are giving you unfiltered, unbiased news.
Time to wake up and do a bit of research son.
Either that or yours was a masterful troll.
.. I have had real world experience with several different embedded OS's running on several different platforms. Have you?
Read this and point out any inaccuracies.
... nor did I claim that all MS products are garbage.
I clearly stated that for OUR applications, a variety of different OS's met our needs. Not just Linux, but also PSOS/VxWorks/Nucleus. I also clearly stated that Linux has several weaknesses, most notably RT requirements (which several groups are working on as we speak) and relatively large footprint (compared to some of the VERY small OS's). One thing I will say is that MS does NOT currently make any embedded products that meet our requirements, and they are unlikely to in the future.
All I ask is for you to not believe the hype.
Now, while we may be talking about embedded systems, realize that there are embedded system companies that have to make their systems work as seamlessly as possible with what their clients have lying about as well.
Cripes, is there anthing in your post that is accurate? I almost missed this gem.
While MS products ARE engineered to work well with other MS products, MS also spends most of its time trying to figure out now NOT to interoperate with other vendors whenever possible. Everybody else (other than MS) is aiming to interoperate with everybody else (including MS). Now, tell me again, if interoperability is a requirment, why I should choose MS?
.. how effective a completely content-free marketing campaign can be. I didn't mean to offend, it just rankles when people base their opinions on what they see on TV and not what their experience tells them.
You just validated Microsoft's arguments with your third point: no plethora of drivers. No matter how fancy Linux has gotten, it still hasn't been able to interface with the huge base of hardware that Microsoft products can. There are a lot of companies that cannot afford fancy new hardware; they must make do on something that was brought in years ago. And Microsoft products play nice with them.
You are smoking crack, son.
Have you actually DONE any embedded work? I have. With PSOS, VxWorks, and Nucleus. On several different processors (AMD29k, i960, M68k, and PPC). With SEVERAL different PCI bridges, chipsets, memory controllers, network interfaces, uarts, and DMA controllers. NONE of which are supported by Microsoft, and NONE of which are unilaterally supported by the OS's we have used. Guess which OS does?
As for support, I would much rather have a big, rich company supporting my software than a bunch of chatrooms. If my system is compromised or causes damage, I want to be able to say, "This company here is responsible for it"
Good for you. All you have proven to me is that you are evasive, slime sucking, scum who LOVES to point fingers and blame somebody else for your problems. *I* would rather have the source code and access to the original author, so that if there IS a problem, I can tell my boss we can a) sack up like men and take responsibility and b) fix it, not hide like good corporate lackeys.
I would not be surprised if XP was better than Linux in alot of aspects for embedded systems, since MS has focused alot more effort towards it.
Do you have ANY real evidence of this other than your perusal of Microsoft's marketing materials? Spend some time in the trenches doing actual work, and less time reading the trade rags, and you might BEGIN to get a clue.
There are hundreds of developers WORLD WIDE who are working hard at building embedded linux devices - and thanks to the GPL they are working cooperatively, and not wasting time re-inventing the wheel.
Have you actually ever worked with any embedded OS's? Vendors LOVE to sell you their OTHER customers code! I don't know about you, but if i needed a driver for a whizbang6583k chip, I would rather talk to the author than a vendor who simply repackaged somebody elses (old) code and sold it to me. Now picture dozens of customers, all fixing the SAME bugs in this whizbang6583k chip, but not knowing that the bugs have already been addressed?
I have done porting work with just about every single embedded OS (some predating windows CE by about a decade). I have built/tested/deployed i960 and AMD29k boards using psos, m68k boards using vxworks, and ppc boards using nucleus, all in house, from scratch. You, sir, apparently have done NONE of those, because if you did, you would know that porting Linux is no different. We did it for three different ppc boards, also in house. The process was no different from developing a BSP for any of the other commercial vendor products. The difference is that Linux 1) is a real OS (even if it is lacking in the RT arena still) 2) no rediculous per unit royalty fees 3) free tools 4) portable tools (i.e. can cross compile from whatever platform I like) 5) rediculously stable 6) HUGE driver support (with source - something the commercial vendors love to nickle-dime you for, btw) 7) a large software library (e.g. just about every useful UNIX app exists in one form another) 8) excellent support via source code, email-lists, and irc. (Yes, the "linux has no support" meme is complete FUD - have you ever tried to negotiate WindRiver's support dept. even WITH a fully paid up support contract?)
The fact that MS has been "doing embedded versions" since the mid (try late) 90's is completely irrelevant. There are a ton of crappy, buggy, useless products that still exist today that their vendors have been "doing" for a lot longer. What makes you think that just because they are old that they don't suck?
Now you are on thin ice. I see an opportunity to profit from robbing a bank. You stop me. Can I sue you for stealing from me?
You poor, deluded, naive little boy.
How exactly is forcing him to rat out his boss in return for being let out of jail (where he has been rotting for months, by your OWN admission) correcting a mistake?
Has anybody thought of using IP laws themselves as a tool to regulate Microsoft? For example, one could choose to selectively enforce their patent or copyright claims.
Considering that it is the *government's* IP laws that help make Microsoft a monopoly in the first place, wouldn't it make sense to start "breaking" their monopoly their?
Here was a PERFECT opportunity to use an open source model, and instead Bill sent everybody bigfoot letters.
Perhaps you are too young to grasp the hobbiest climate at the time. There were a few dozen hackers (tops) playing with the Altair when it was released. Why? It was expensive, bulky, and basically useless. The only people playing with this device were freaks and geeks who enjoyed the challenge of a new (useless gadget). We are NOT talking about a consumer device needing software for the masses.
BillG did NOT stand to lose ANY money from people "stealing" his prized code (and there is evidence that it wasn't even Bill's code... Paul Allen allegedly did most of the work.. it was up to Bill to take care of the "business" side). We are talking a miniscule market here - say, 20 people, optimistically.
The Altair in general would have benefitted greatly from a COOPERATIVE effort, something that BillG was (and still is) incapable of comprehending. In his twisted, narcissistic, self-absorbed mind, all he can see are profit margins. This single letter completely decimated the Altair as a platform, and most hobbiests threw up their hands in utter disgust of BillG's sickening strong arm tactics.
Anybody who buys Bill's rediculous assertion that he created Open Source needs a severe beating with a clue stick.
History lesson: Bill's first reaction to an "Open Source" effort was the following (infamous) letter:
An Open Letter to Hobbyists
To me, the most critical thing in the hobby market right now is the lack of good software courses, books and software itself. Without good software and an owner who understands programming, a hobby computer is wasted. Will quality software be written for the hobby market
Almost a year ago, Paul Allen and myself, expecting the hobby market to expand, hired Monte Davidoff and developed Altair BASIC. Though the initial work took only two months, the three of us have spent most of the last year documenting, improving and adding features to BASIC. Now we have 4K, 8K, EXTENDED, ROM and DISK BASIC. The value of the computer time we have used exceeds $40,000.
The feedback we have gotten from the hundreds of people who say they are using BASIC has all been positive. Two surprising things are apparent, however, 1) Most of these "users" never bought BASIC (less than 10% of all Altair owners have bought BASIC), and 2) The amount of royalties we have received from sales to hobbyists makes the time spent on Altair BASIC worth less than $2 an hour.
Why is this? As the majority of hobbyists must be aware, most of you steal your software. Hardware must be paid for, but software is something to share. Who cares if the people who worked on it get paid?
Is this fair? One thing you don't do by stealing software is get back at MITS for some problem you may have had. MITS doesn't make money selling software. The royalty paid to us, the manual, the tape and the overhead make it a break-even operation. One thing you do do is prevent good software from being written. Who can afford to do professional work for nothing? What hobbyist can put 3-man years into programming, finding all bugs, documenting his product and distribute for free? The fact is, no one besides us has invested a lot of money in hobby software. We have written 6800 BASIC, and are writing 8080 APL and 6800 APL, but there is very little incentive to make this software available to hobbyists. Most directly, the thing you do is theft.
What about the guys who re-sell Altair BASIC, aren't they making money on hobby software? Yes, but those who have been reported to us may lose in the end. They are the ones who give hobbyists a bad name, and should be kicked out of any club meeting they show up at.
I would appreciate letters from any one who wants to pay up, or has a suggestion or comment. Just write to me at 1180 Alvarado SE, #114, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 87108. Nothing would please me more than being able to hire ten programmers and deluge the hobby market with good software.
Bill Gates
General Partner, Micro-Soft
What a ringing endorsement of the principals of Open Source.
Why am I not suprised that Cringley is ignorant of this letter?