I wonder if they're going to keep the format similar to the book
I hope not. The BBC radio plays were scripted so that the two
threads intermingled. It worked quite nicely I thought.
By and large I don't like films that deviate from the books
they're based on (after all, what's the point in making the film
if you're going to throw away those bits of the book that drew
you to it in the first place) but I understand the need to make
alterations for cinematic purposes. That is, narrative techniques
that work in literature don't necessarily work in cinema. The
episodic nature of Two Towers is a perfect example of this I
think.
The House of Lords is made up of an eccentric
bunch of old codgers
For the most part, that may be correct but it's misleading.
Lord Winston, for example is one of the world's leading
geneticists and is a Lord for that very reason. I would hardly
describe him as an old codger. Moreover, the fact that he is part
of the UKs legislature leaves me feeling a lot more secure in
Parliament's ability to pass sensible laws involving genetics.
It's a pity that there aren't any leading computer scientists in
the HoL.
The problem with the HoL isn't that it's non-elected, it's who
it's populated with. (In fact, the fact that it's un-democratic
is it's strength. Modern democracy is little more than a
popularity contest as someone else has said, by removing the HoL
from that process it becomes apolitical and the need to toe the
party line is extinguished.)
a) Stallman has nothing to do with Open Source and I'm sure he doesn't care whether he's a joke or not in those circles. Moreover, looking at the comments you speak of, they seem to come from proffesional RMS berators and are no credit to the Open Source movement at all.
b) Hurd works fine as far as I can tell. It's not perfect, but neither is any other OS.
c) The Hurd is a very small part of the GNU project, the majority of which forms a very large and very important part of many Linux distributions.
d) The Milli Vanilli reference is a bit sharp isn't it? IIRC, Milli Vanilli were a manufactured pop band who mimed to other people singing their songs. I fail to see how RMS can be compared to these people.
--
I can't understand why people insist on bashing RMS. He's contributed a lot to the computer industry and continues to do so.
I could be coarse at this point and ask what have you ever done that has influenced the computer industry in any significant manner, but I won't bother as I suspect the list would be very, very short.
It's true, the EU are no saints in this regard. It is for
instance, one of only a handful of governments that operate in
secret; even to it's own members of "parliament", meetings and
policy decisions are routinely undertaken behind closed doors.
However, the EU, like all governments, is not a gestalt entity. I know for a fact that a
lot of the British representatives in the European Parliament
stand for election simply because they dislike the institution
as it exists at present. I can sympathise with this
perspective - conceptually, there is nothing wrong with the EU
but in reality it is far more sinister (secret policy decisions)
than it appears in the right wing presses. But I digress...
The individual members of the European Parliament then, are
autonomous entities. A good many of them are there only so that they
can improve the democratic process in whatever way they can and
as I say, do not necessarily toe the party line (ie. they are not professional politicians).
I can't speak for Meijer and I know nothing of him beyond what I
read in The Register just now, but I suspect he's one of the
mavericks I speak of and is just as critical as the EU's privacy
policy as he is of Microsoft's. Although I am prepared to be corrected.
You are right of course, tyre's can't be expected to withstand
impacts with titanium shards at high speed. However, the problem
wasn't with the tyre's as such, but with the fuel tanks. Fuel
tanks on the Concorde used to have very little protection meaning
that anything hitting the wing at high velocity could rupture
them. In fact, it's a wonder a similar accident hadn't happened
before.
So, although an exploding tyre caused the accident, it was not
the problem. Trying to prevent future, similar accidents by
changing the type of tyres would be futile (the fuel tank could
be ruptured in some other fashion) and woefully misguided. You
may as well attempt to prevent DC-10s shedding titatium.
In a nutshell, this guy videoed the speedometer of his bike doing
175mph! When he was collared by the Old Bill (forgone conclusion
really), they had ready made evidence.
ftp://ftp.ifarchive.org/if-archive/games/zcode/s of tporn.zip
The ZMachine is the virtual machine used by Infocom for their classic games. It has since been completely reverse engineered and is well supported by interpreters and programming languages.
On the whole I would agree, the film makers themselves are in the best position to comment on the film. However, this idea would really come to life when people submit "background information" commentries, ie. something a film maker wouldn't necessarily know anything about.
For example, and someone has already mentioned this, a commentry by a psychologist discussing the lead characters in Memento or Pi would be fascinating -- at least to me.
Another example might be a compare and contrast discussion of a piece of literature and it's celluloid adaptation. I would suggest Lord of the Rings would be a great candidate for this (Crikey, I've wasted countless hours in the pub critiquing this film already, perhaps I should do it:-)
Ebert's been pushing that 48 fps film for years now. 48 fps means
the film is running through the camera/projector twice as fast.
If the image size is the same, that means you're burning film
twice as fast, which means your film costs are twice as high.
Not quite true. More film is used, but not twice as much.
Regular 35mm film wastes a lot of film anyway, simply because of
having to crop the academy ratio to 2.35:1. MaxiVision48, which
is the "new" medium we're talking about, theoriseses that nobody
uses academy format anymore and "squeezes" the 2.35:1 frames as
closely as possible. As a result, MaxiVision uses less
space per frame and more frames per second, but vanilla 35mm uses
more film per frame - which almost evens out.
MaxiVision24 definately uses less film and has
many advantages depsite being only 24fps.
I've not explained that very well, I'm sure, so I'll point
to this page for a better explanation.
...and if you had read the article, you would know that RMS
didn't know of Miguel's intentions until he was asked a direct
question by a memeber of the audience.
Never mind though, eh? Any excuse for a bit of RMS bashing.
If by uselss you mean, simply and non-sensationally reporting a
statement made by a genuine and otherwise respected doctor, and a
contrary statement by Sony; then yes I agree, British newspapers
are useless. Although, I always thought that's what newspapers
were supposed to do. I.E. keep their opinions to themselves
- after all that's what we're here for....
In this case, it is the doctor himself who is being senstational.
I suspect he's never seen or used a vibrating controller. If he
had, he would realise that these things are no more dangerous
than a purring cat. "Vibratory White Finger" is usually
experienced by roadworkers and miners, not minors.
Second, GPL violations are NOT copyright violations.
If you agree to a license and violate the terms of the license,
it's not a copyright violation, it's a license violation.
This is the crux of the argument.
If by copyright violation you mean one of these 6 basic acts that
only the owner of the copyrighted work can perform then I agree,
copyright violation is not the same as a licence violation and
that also, in that sense, a GPL violation is indeed, not a
copyright violation.
(The points above marked with an asterisk are of course special
cases in relation to computer software).
1)*to copy the work
2)*to issue copies of the work
3) to rent or lend the work to the public
4) to perform, show or play the work in public
5) to broadcast the work or include it in a cable programme service
6)*to make an adaptation of the work or do any of the above in
relation to an adapation
[The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, Section 16]
However, to my mind, the distinction is hardly relevant to the
topic at hand. Violation of any licence or performing any of the
above acts on a copyrighted work without licence to do so is
"wrong" and all covered by the same law.
Hence my original point - why should "commerical" software be
singled out in the article, when the law applies equally to
"non-commercial" software. I admit however, that I was wrong to
mention speficially the GPL - using my logic, this thinking
applies to all licences.
Now, whether or not you think this should be called software
piracy or not is of no interest to me and I shall not discuss it.
I was simply using the language of the article.
Suffice to say that I agree, the words "piracy" and especially
"theft" are both misleading phrases in relation to copyright law.
If you truly think these posts are trolls, don't reply.
No I don't believe they are Trolls, we were talking at
cross-purposes.
Finally, I hope you realise that I'm not in the habit of calling
GPL violations, "piracy". In fact this thread is the first time
I've mentioned it I think.
If you're talking "piracy", you're talking the theft at sea
kind.
Sheesh! Are you trolling or what? I've stipulated that I am
talking about software piracy. If you insist on persisting with
this line of argument I can only assume you are indeed a troll.
There is no other. If you use the term "software piracy"
you're just making up strong-sounding terms to justify your
positions.
No, I'm using the terms that are used in a legal context and in
everyday use - I didn't invent the terms.
No. Licenses are contracts entered into to go beyond the
default protections (either way) of copyright law. Violating a
license is contract violation.
That's what I said.
And some people would be wrong. Try calling it "copyright
violation" or "unlawful copying".
If you want to argue over semantics then you're arguing on your
own.
If you think that "software piracy" relates to unlawful copying (ie, warez)
then extending it to GPL violation is technically incorrect.
That's precisely what I don't think. Are you reading what I'm
posting, or is this just flamebait?
A GPL violation is akin to creating a derivative work.
They're both copyright violations, but otherwise are much
different.
Jesus! What are you arguing about? You've just said that "warez"
and GPL violations are both copyright violations. What on Earth
do you think I've been saying?
You're able to pick up a piece of GPLed software and use it in any way that
copyright law allows. There are no further restrictions. There are no
licenses getting in the way. The GPL isn't in effect now. If you want to do
more with this software then you can accept the author's offered contract, at
which point you will have licensed the software, to go beyond the rights
copyright law would have given you. The difference is that Microsoft would
have you believe that their license (if it was valid) is in effect the whole
time you use their software. The GPL is clear about not being active until
you accept it. You're governed only by copyright law until you choose to
change that.
That's why I think it's an important point.
Whether or not the GPL is a shrink-wrap EULA is irrelevent (I
don't believe it is for the record)
Whether shrink-wrap EULAs are legally valid or not is irrelevent
(For the record, I don't believe they are.)
When and where the GPL come into effect is irrelevent.
(For the record, I agree with your summary in this regard.)
You really should stop using the term "piracy" though. It'll
help your credability.
In realtion to the world of computer software, it's been in use
for about 20 years that I can remember. Anyway in this respect,
it seems that you're taking issue with this entire thread, not
just my post.
Just like the "hacker" and "cracker" thing. Big business may
want to stigmatize an activity but that doesn't mean everyone
needs to buy into it and play along.
I didn't invent the term software piracy. Other people use that
term to describe a certain action - my original point is that
"software piracy" (a term in common usage) is not something that
is restricted to "commercial" software.
It's really quite simple. That you can't grasp the simple logic
is quite frankly, disturbing:
o Violaton of the GPL (using your terms) is a copyright violation.
o Unlawful copying (ie "warez", again using your terms) is a
also copyright violation.
o Some people call the latter "software piracy" because it's a
copyright violaton.
o Therefore, a copyright violation in general is "software piracy"
Whether or not you think the term "software piracy" is
appropriate or not is of no interest to me. It's just a phrase
that conveys a meaning as far as I'm concerned.
I did actually specify software piracy. Not that it should have
been necessary given the context this discussion is taking place
in.
Unlawful copying and contract violation... are not piracy
Are we still talking about piracy at sea, or software piracy?
Furthermore, unlawful copying isn't a violation of the licence
agreement...it's a violation of copyright law
What do you think a licence is? A copyright licence is
"permission given to another person authorising him to do certain
things in relation to the copyright work". In other words,
violation of any clause in the licence is a "violation of
copyright law". Some people call this software piracy.
With regards to software piracy: "an example would be importaing
or selling copies of computer software without the permission of
the owner of the copyright in the software". In other words, the
offending party hasn't been granted licence to import or sell
copies of that software (it is the being granted licence part
that is important here).
Moreover, under English law, the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act
1988, Section 107(1), clause (e) states that "distributing
otherwise than in the course of business to such an extent as to
affect prejudicially the owner of the copyright". Now I would say that
a disregard for the GPL when dealing with a piece of software
distributed with that licence falls under that law - at least from
the point of view of the copyright holder.
When we consider that that entire section of law deals with what
people often term as "software piracy", I think that referring to
GPL violation as software piracy is fair comment.
The GPL isn't really a license...
It's a copyright licence in all meaningful senses of the word.
it's an "offer" of a contract, whereby you will follow a
certain license in trade for certain "consideration" (the right
to use the source code, etc).
That's what a copyright licence is!
Introduction to Computer Law, 4th ed. David Bainbridge.
Ibid.
I would have thought that US law is pretty much the same in
this regard.
Using a piece of software just because it's open source seems
pretty silly to me
Not at all. The BBC has a legal obligation to broadcast to as
many people in the British Commenwealth as possible. Without Ogg
Vorbis I couldn't hear BBC web broadcasts as the commericial
companies who pedal this sort of technology, deems me unworthy of
it's custom.
As a licence payer I expect nothing less that the use of Open
Source software by the BBC. I don't pay £100 a year only to be
told I need to use this piece of software on this piece of
hardware in order to recieve a broadcast I have already paid for.
Piracy is always associated with the copying/use of software that
should have been paid for. Strictly however, software piracy is
violation of a software licence.
It's worth mentioning then that violation of the GPL for example,
is also piracy.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=25273&thresh ol d=3&commentsort=3&mode=thread&cid=2748115
The poster said that an employer backing up an employee is
unheard of anywhere. I replied with the sentiment that it isn't
so strange in places where the rule of money isn't sovereign.
The fact is, Skylarov was employed by a company to do a job. He
did his job so well that he was arrested for his efforts (under
dubious circumstances). I personally don't find it surprising
that Elcomsoft should support their employee in the way that they
did. I would be alarmed if Elcomsoft and Skylarov lived in the
West and this happened however.
It is a great movie but no movie maker can possibly examine every
nuance of the book. It hasn't "made a mess" of it, and betray is
perhaps too harsh a word, but watching the movie and reading the
book are two different experiences. Listening to the radio play
offers another.
If you can imagine the book as a three-dimensional object, the
film takes a two-dimensional view of the story, the radio play a
different two-dimensional view. However, IMO, the latter's
interpretation captures the more important elements of the book.
In other words, the experience offered by the written word is
more similar to that of the radio play than of the film.
I bought the box set of the LotR radio play many years ago and
have enjoyed it many times. One of the landmark radio
dramatisations featuring a superb cast: Ian Holm as Frodo (who
played Bilbo in the Jackson movie); Sir Michael Horden as
Gandalf; John LeMesseurier as Bilbo; and Robert Stephens as
Aragorn. It also features Peter Woodthorpe as Gollum, who
incidentally also played that character in the animated movie.
A matter of opinion of course, but I consider it a superior
adaptation than the recent film. While Jackson's effort is very,
very good, it (through necessity) betrays the book in many ways
resulting in a superficial version of the story. The BBC
dramatisation on the other hand, leaves the subtleties of the
story intact, resulting in a more rounded experience. The only
ommission of note is the absence, as usual, of Tom Bombadil.
If you have never heard a radio play, do yourself a favour and
have a listen to this.
Computers are inherently not metric so why should the metric
defintions of words affect a non-metric context? Have the SI
board trademarked the metric prefixes?
The metric system works in the real world because the
measurements are completely arbitrary - ie. they don't relate to
anything in the real world. A kilobyte in the context of
computing is not arbitrary.
Redefining a kilobyte in the computing context is a bit like
redefining what an inch, a rod or a biblical cubit is -
non-aribitrary measurements that mean something concrete in the
physical world.
Slashdot Mirror
I wonder if they're going to keep the format similar to the book
I hope not. The BBC radio plays were scripted so that the two threads intermingled. It worked quite nicely I thought.
By and large I don't like films that deviate from the books they're based on (after all, what's the point in making the film if you're going to throw away those bits of the book that drew you to it in the first place) but I understand the need to make alterations for cinematic purposes. That is, narrative techniques that work in literature don't necessarily work in cinema. The episodic nature of Two Towers is a perfect example of this I think.
Doh! I must have been eating those funny mushrooms again. What was I thinking? :-)
The House of Lords is made up of an eccentric bunch of old codgers
For the most part, that may be correct but it's misleading.
Lord Winston, for example is one of the world's leading geneticists and is a Lord for that very reason. I would hardly describe him as an old codger. Moreover, the fact that he is part of the UKs legislature leaves me feeling a lot more secure in Parliament's ability to pass sensible laws involving genetics. It's a pity that there aren't any leading computer scientists in the HoL.
The problem with the HoL isn't that it's non-elected, it's who it's populated with. (In fact, the fact that it's un-democratic is it's strength. Modern democracy is little more than a popularity contest as someone else has said, by removing the HoL from that process it becomes apolitical and the need to toe the party line is extinguished.)
a) Stallman has nothing to do with Open Source and I'm sure he
doesn't care whether he's a joke or not in those circles.
Moreover, looking at the comments you speak of, they seem to come
from proffesional RMS berators and are no credit to the Open
Source movement at all.
b) Hurd works fine as far as I can tell. It's not perfect, but
neither is any other OS.
c) The Hurd is a very small part of the GNU project, the majority
of which forms a very large and very important part of many Linux
distributions.
d) The Milli Vanilli reference is a bit sharp isn't it? IIRC,
Milli Vanilli were a manufactured pop band who mimed to other
people singing their songs. I fail to see how RMS can be compared
to these people.
--
I can't understand why people insist on bashing RMS. He's
contributed a lot to the computer industry and continues to do
so.
I could be coarse at this point and ask what have you ever done
that has influenced the computer industry in any significant
manner, but I won't bother as I suspect the list would be very,
very short.
It's true, the EU are no saints in this regard. It is for instance, one of only a handful of governments that operate in secret; even to it's own members of "parliament", meetings and policy decisions are routinely undertaken behind closed doors.
However, the EU, like all governments, is not a gestalt entity. I know for a fact that a lot of the British representatives in the European Parliament stand for election simply because they dislike the institution as it exists at present. I can sympathise with this perspective - conceptually, there is nothing wrong with the EU but in reality it is far more sinister (secret policy decisions) than it appears in the right wing presses. But I digress...
The individual members of the European Parliament then, are autonomous entities. A good many of them are there only so that they can improve the democratic process in whatever way they can and as I say, do not necessarily toe the party line (ie. they are not professional politicians). I can't speak for Meijer and I know nothing of him beyond what I read in The Register just now, but I suspect he's one of the mavericks I speak of and is just as critical as the EU's privacy policy as he is of Microsoft's. Although I am prepared to be corrected.
You are right of course, tyre's can't be expected to withstand impacts with titanium shards at high speed. However, the problem wasn't with the tyre's as such, but with the fuel tanks. Fuel tanks on the Concorde used to have very little protection meaning that anything hitting the wing at high velocity could rupture them. In fact, it's a wonder a similar accident hadn't happened before.
So, although an exploding tyre caused the accident, it was not the problem. Trying to prevent future, similar accidents by changing the type of tyres would be futile (the fuel tank could be ruptured in some other fashion) and woefully misguided. You may as well attempt to prevent DC-10s shedding titatium.
I don't think we ever knew what system the original show was done on. I assumed it was a custom vector system.. anyone know?
...and some very good computer-generated special effects (mostly
done on Amiga 1000s).
TechTV has the answer.
Your post reminded of the following news item that appeared in British newspapers a couple of years ago.
Speedy Video Gets Biker Jailed
In a nutshell, this guy videoed the speedometer of his bike doing 175mph! When he was collared by the Old Bill (forgone conclusion really), they had ready made evidence.
Quite humorous in a way, but pretty scary too.
There's a ZMachine remake of Softporn
s of tporn.zip
r pr eters/frotz
ftp://ftp.ifarchive.org/if-archive/games/zcode/
The ZMachine is the virtual machine used by
Infocom for their classic games. It has since
been completely reverse engineered and is
well supported by interpreters and programming
languages.
To play the game, dowload frotz for your platform
ftp://ftp.ifarchive.org/if-archive/infocom/inte
On the whole I would agree, the film makers themselves are in the
:-)
best position to comment on the film. However, this idea would
really come to life when people submit "background information"
commentries, ie. something a film maker wouldn't necessarily know
anything about.
For example, and someone has already mentioned this, a commentry
by a psychologist discussing the lead characters in Memento or Pi
would be fascinating -- at least to me.
Another example might be a compare and contrast discussion of a
piece of literature and it's celluloid adaptation. I would
suggest Lord of the Rings would be a great candidate for this
(Crikey, I've wasted countless hours in the pub critiquing this
film already, perhaps I should do it
Ebert's been pushing that 48 fps film for years now. 48 fps means the film is running through the camera/projector twice as fast. If the image size is the same, that means you're burning film twice as fast, which means your film costs are twice as high.
Not quite true. More film is used, but not twice as much.
Regular 35mm film wastes a lot of film anyway, simply because of having to crop the academy ratio to 2.35:1. MaxiVision48, which is the "new" medium we're talking about, theoriseses that nobody uses academy format anymore and "squeezes" the 2.35:1 frames as closely as possible. As a result, MaxiVision uses less space per frame and more frames per second, but vanilla 35mm uses more film per frame - which almost evens out.
MaxiVision24 definately uses less film and has many advantages depsite being only 24fps.
I've not explained that very well, I'm sure, so I'll point to this page for a better explanation.
The idea of having 60fps instead of the usual 24fps already has a solution - although it settles for 48 rather than 60.
I won't go into too much detail as there's a perfectly good explanation here.
...and if you had read the article, you would know that RMS
didn't know of Miguel's intentions until he was asked a direct
question by a memeber of the audience.
Never mind though, eh? Any excuse for a bit of RMS bashing.
If by uselss you mean, simply and non-sensationally reporting a statement made by a genuine and otherwise respected doctor, and a contrary statement by Sony; then yes I agree, British newspapers are useless. Although, I always thought that's what newspapers were supposed to do. I.E. keep their opinions to themselves - after all that's what we're here for.... In this case, it is the doctor himself who is being senstational. I suspect he's never seen or used a vibrating controller. If he had, he would realise that these things are no more dangerous than a purring cat. "Vibratory White Finger" is usually experienced by roadworkers and miners, not minors.
Second, GPL violations are NOT copyright violations.
If you agree to a license and violate the terms of the license,
it's not a copyright violation, it's a license violation.
This is the crux of the argument.
If by copyright violation you mean one of these 6 basic acts that
only the owner of the copyrighted work can perform then I agree,
copyright violation is not the same as a licence violation and
that also, in that sense, a GPL violation is indeed, not a
copyright violation.
(The points above marked with an asterisk are of course special
cases in relation to computer software).
1)*to copy the work
2)*to issue copies of the work
3) to rent or lend the work to the public
4) to perform, show or play the work in public
5) to broadcast the work or include it in a cable programme service
6)*to make an adaptation of the work or do any of the above in
relation to an adapation
[The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, Section 16]
However, to my mind, the distinction is hardly relevant to the
topic at hand. Violation of any licence or performing any of the
above acts on a copyrighted work without licence to do so is
"wrong" and all covered by the same law.
Hence my original point - why should "commerical" software be
singled out in the article, when the law applies equally to
"non-commercial" software. I admit however, that I was wrong to
mention speficially the GPL - using my logic, this thinking
applies to all licences.
Now, whether or not you think this should be called software
piracy or not is of no interest to me and I shall not discuss it.
I was simply using the language of the article.
Suffice to say that I agree, the words "piracy" and especially
"theft" are both misleading phrases in relation to copyright law.
If you truly think these posts are trolls, don't reply.
No I don't believe they are Trolls, we were talking at
cross-purposes.
Finally, I hope you realise that I'm not in the habit of calling
GPL violations, "piracy". In fact this thread is the first time
I've mentioned it I think.
If you're talking "piracy", you're talking the theft at sea
kind.
Sheesh! Are you trolling or what? I've stipulated that I am
talking about software piracy. If you insist on persisting with
this line of argument I can only assume you are indeed a troll.
There is no other. If you use the term "software piracy"
you're just making up strong-sounding terms to justify your
positions.
No, I'm using the terms that are used in a legal context and in
everyday use - I didn't invent the terms.
No. Licenses are contracts entered into to go beyond the
default protections (either way) of copyright law. Violating a
license is contract violation.
That's what I said.
And some people would be wrong. Try calling it "copyright
violation" or "unlawful copying".
If you want to argue over semantics then you're arguing on your
own.
If you think that "software piracy" relates to unlawful copying (ie, warez)
then extending it to GPL violation is technically incorrect.
That's precisely what I don't think. Are you reading what I'm
posting, or is this just flamebait?
A GPL violation is akin to creating a derivative work.
They're both copyright violations, but otherwise are much
different.
Jesus! What are you arguing about? You've just said that "warez"
and GPL violations are both copyright violations. What on Earth
do you think I've been saying?
You're able to pick up a piece of GPLed software and use it in any way that
copyright law allows. There are no further restrictions. There are no
licenses getting in the way. The GPL isn't in effect now. If you want to do
more with this software then you can accept the author's offered contract, at
which point you will have licensed the software, to go beyond the rights
copyright law would have given you. The difference is that Microsoft would
have you believe that their license (if it was valid) is in effect the whole
time you use their software. The GPL is clear about not being active until
you accept it. You're governed only by copyright law until you choose to
change that.
That's why I think it's an important point.
Whether or not the GPL is a shrink-wrap EULA is irrelevent (I
don't believe it is for the record)
Whether shrink-wrap EULAs are legally valid or not is irrelevent
(For the record, I don't believe they are.)
When and where the GPL come into effect is irrelevent.
(For the record, I agree with your summary in this regard.)
You really should stop using the term "piracy" though. It'll
help your credability.
In realtion to the world of computer software, it's been in use
for about 20 years that I can remember. Anyway in this respect,
it seems that you're taking issue with this entire thread, not
just my post.
Just like the "hacker" and "cracker" thing. Big business may
want to stigmatize an activity but that doesn't mean everyone
needs to buy into it and play along.
I didn't invent the term software piracy. Other people use that
term to describe a certain action - my original point is that
"software piracy" (a term in common usage) is not something that
is restricted to "commercial" software.
It's really quite simple. That you can't grasp the simple logic
is quite frankly, disturbing:
o Violaton of the GPL (using your terms) is a copyright violation.
o Unlawful copying (ie "warez", again using your terms) is a
also copyright violation.
o Some people call the latter "software piracy" because it's a
copyright violaton.
o Therefore, a copyright violation in general is "software piracy"
Whether or not you think the term "software piracy" is
appropriate or not is of no interest to me. It's just a phrase
that conveys a meaning as far as I'm concerned.
Strictly speaking, piracy is theft at sea
I did actually specify software piracy. Not that it should have
been necessary given the context this discussion is taking place
in.
Unlawful copying and contract violation... are not piracy
Are we still talking about piracy at sea, or software piracy?
Furthermore, unlawful copying isn't a violation of the licence
agreement...it's a violation of copyright law
What do you think a licence is? A copyright licence is
"permission given to another person authorising him to do certain
things in relation to the copyright work". In other words,
violation of any clause in the licence is a "violation of
copyright law". Some people call this software piracy.
With regards to software piracy: "an example would be importaing
or selling copies of computer software without the permission of
the owner of the copyright in the software". In other words, the
offending party hasn't been granted licence to import or sell
copies of that software (it is the being granted licence part
that is important here).
Moreover, under English law, the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act
1988, Section 107(1), clause (e) states that "distributing
otherwise than in the course of business to such an extent as to
affect prejudicially the owner of the copyright". Now I would say that
a disregard for the GPL when dealing with a piece of software
distributed with that licence falls under that law - at least from
the point of view of the copyright holder.
When we consider that that entire section of law deals with what
people often term as "software piracy", I think that referring to
GPL violation as software piracy is fair comment.
The GPL isn't really a license...
It's a copyright licence in all meaningful senses of the word.
it's an "offer" of a contract, whereby you will follow a
certain license in trade for certain "consideration" (the right
to use the source code, etc).
That's what a copyright licence is!
Introduction to Computer Law, 4th ed. David Bainbridge.
Ibid.
I would have thought that US law is pretty much the same in
this regard.
Using a piece of software just because it's open source seems
pretty silly to me
Not at all. The BBC has a legal obligation to broadcast to as
many people in the British Commenwealth as possible. Without Ogg
Vorbis I couldn't hear BBC web broadcasts as the commericial
companies who pedal this sort of technology, deems me unworthy of
it's custom.
As a licence payer I expect nothing less that the use of Open
Source software by the BBC. I don't pay £100 a year only to be
told I need to use this piece of software on this piece of
hardware in order to recieve a broadcast I have already paid for.
Piracy is always associated with the copying/use of software that
should have been paid for. Strictly however, software piracy is
violation of a software licence.
It's worth mentioning then that violation of the GPL for example,
is also piracy.
I was replying to this,
h ol d=3&commentsort=3&mode=thread&cid=2748115
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=25273&thres
The poster said that an employer backing up an employee is
unheard of anywhere. I replied with the sentiment that it isn't
so strange in places where the rule of money isn't sovereign.
The fact is, Skylarov was employed by a company to do a job. He
did his job so well that he was arrested for his efforts (under
dubious circumstances). I personally don't find it surprising
that Elcomsoft should support their employee in the way that they
did. I would be alarmed if Elcomsoft and Skylarov lived in the
West and this happened however.
It is a great movie but no movie maker can possibly examine every
nuance of the book. It hasn't "made a mess" of it, and betray is
perhaps too harsh a word, but watching the movie and reading the
book are two different experiences. Listening to the radio play
offers another.
If you can imagine the book as a three-dimensional object, the
film takes a two-dimensional view of the story, the radio play a
different two-dimensional view. However, IMO, the latter's
interpretation captures the more important elements of the book.
In other words, the experience offered by the written word is
more similar to that of the radio play than of the film.
This isn't meant as a critique of either work.
Because he wasn't in this Radio play, nor the
:-)
live action movie, nor the animated movie.
Poor old Tom. No one loves him
I bought the box set of the LotR radio play many years ago and
have enjoyed it many times. One of the landmark radio
dramatisations featuring a superb cast: Ian Holm as Frodo (who
played Bilbo in the Jackson movie); Sir Michael Horden as
Gandalf; John LeMesseurier as Bilbo; and Robert Stephens as
Aragorn. It also features Peter Woodthorpe as Gollum, who
incidentally also played that character in the animated movie.
A matter of opinion of course, but I consider it a superior
adaptation than the recent film. While Jackson's effort is very,
very good, it (through necessity) betrays the book in many ways
resulting in a superficial version of the story. The BBC
dramatisation on the other hand, leaves the subtleties of the
story intact, resulting in a more rounded experience. The only
ommission of note is the absence, as usual, of Tom Bombadil.
If you have never heard a radio play, do yourself a favour and
have a listen to this.
It's not unheard of "anywhere". Only in those countries where
money and profit are considered more important than the
individual.
Computers are inherently not metric so why should the metric
defintions of words affect a non-metric context? Have the SI
board trademarked the metric prefixes?
The metric system works in the real world because the
measurements are completely arbitrary - ie. they don't relate to
anything in the real world. A kilobyte in the context of
computing is not arbitrary.
Redefining a kilobyte in the computing context is a bit like
redefining what an inch, a rod or a biblical cubit is -
non-aribitrary measurements that mean something concrete in the
physical world.