There is nothing "imaginary" about intellectual property. It is the 21-st century and making most things is getting easier every year. Designing things remains hard.
But the fruits of the designer's labor are even easier to duplicate than to implement. Copying them without the creator's permission is just as immoral (and often illegal) as the traditional stealing is.
The submitter seems to imply, the non-tangible property is entirely "imaginary" and thus one can choose to "believe" in it — or not... He also links to a page of a perfectly respectable organization, which has nothing in common with his inflammatory "name"...
Under this administration, The WTO and Antiguan people are now terrorists. Prepare for us to spend 1 billion dollars a day in taxpayer funds to attack you now.
Start holding your breath now.
Post an example of an organization, that was declared "terrorist" by "this administration" without actually using terrorism as in:
terrorism, act of terrorism, terrorist act -- (the calculated use of violence (or the threat of violence) against civilians in order to attain goals that are political or religious or ideological in nature; this is done through intimidation or coercion or instilling fear)
I will admit that right now, we're well ahead of Russia in [...]
Thank you. For cleanliness you could have also retracted your dismissive:
Of course, the Russians have been kicking our asses in space technology ever since Sputnik.
I guess, that was a bit of an overstatement, was not it?
You set up a false argument, and then showed to your satisfaction that it was false; that's exactly what a straw man is.
The argument, which you dismissed as "strawman", was that our existing (for years) GPS is superior to the Russian vaporware system. This superiority is a relevant counter-example to your above-quoted claim. This relevance makes you wrong thrice: 1) the original claim; 2) the dismissal of the counter-example as a "strawman"; 3) the insistance on it being a "strawman". Aren't you tired?
Right. And when you grow up, you'll really-really kick that guy's ass. But today he is kicking yours...
There's a big difference between "one of these days..." and having an actual, workable plan building on a good track record.
Well, start holding your breath now.
You, on the other hand, seem to be stuck in a fantasy world Russia simply can't build good space tech, despite decades of evidence to the contrary.
I know quite a bit more about Russia building anything than you and your father combined. They can build a space-craft, but they can not build a usable device. As the joke said, it will neither hum nor go where it is supposed to.
The quality of Soviet/Russian-made electronics sucks. You are talking about some awesome track-record, when, in fact, there is not any — not in the field of consumer-oriented space tech. All they have done before was done for the state's needs of prestige and military. And what little consumer electronics were made in Soviet times (none is made now), it was horrible. Not just subpar — horrible...
They may succeed this time, but I'm rather skeptical. If the world does get a GPS-alternative, it is far more likely that it will be a European one, although a sudden appearance of a Japanese or even a Chinese system can't be ruled out.
Technically impressive, sure, but Russian space tech from that era, in somewhat upgraded form, is still flying; American space tech from that era exists only as rusting static displays.
"In somewhat upgraded form" our spacecraft are also still flying. In fact, it is such a wonderful all-encompassing expression — "in somewhat upgraded form" — that, pretty much, everything qualifies... But thank you for granting the "technically impressive" bit. One could deduce from that, that US has beaten the Soviets' butt back then at least on something.
And the Soviets knew that, BTW — they would not even deny it. Back when the whole world was glued to their TV-screens watching in awe as the Americans were walking on the Moon, the Soviet TV-viewers were shown some old footage of ballet... This is something your father would not be able to tell you.
You also conveniently skipped our Mars explorers — do ask your father, how those are inferior to a Russian tractor or something and get back to me...
Straw man. The fact that they haven't built a worldwide GPS equivalent doesn't mean they're not going to do so
You may need a refresher, on what "straw man" means. You should also look up, what "kicking butt" means too — Russian GLONASS remains vaporware, and yet you refuse to submit, that even in the field of GPS (ubiquitously available for years) America is ahead of the Soviets/Russians.
adding more satellites will provide more coverage. It's really that simple.
Right. And when you grow up, you'll really-really kick that guy's ass. But today he is kicking yours...
Of course, the Russians have been kicking our asses in space technology ever since Sputnik.
Somehow I missed the news of the Soviets/Russians landing on the Moon, surveying Mars, and, to bring us back to the subject at hand, developing a reliable GPS technology (what we are discussing here, is a system with no practically usable devices yet, and covering only the territory of Russia itself).
Other than that, yes, they "have been kicking our asses in space technology". Sure...
For example it can kick all Georgian, Moldovan imports and exports to Ukraine profilactically at its whim.
Yes, it can. But then the WTO-members — all of whom have to approve every new would-be member — may get upset and one or two of them may go as far as veto Russia's entry into the organization.
And should Ukraine — or any other direct victim of Russia's meddling — join WTO before Russia, they will suddenly have serious defense against Russia's "profilactical" shenanigans with which the infamous "Prison of the Nations" is trying to rebuild its rotten empire.
At least our military won't fsck up in Chechnya mountains thanks to deliberate QoS degradation of GPS-provided coordinates over those regions during one of recent Chechen wars.
But you will still fsck up there — and everywhere else in USSR — thanks to the deliberately incorrect Soviet maps:)
Q: It does not hum and it would not go up your ass. What is it?
A: It is a Soviet-made hummer for going up people's asses.
Now, Russia is not exactly like Soviet Union, but it is not entirely dissimilar either. So even if they do provide coverage for other parts of the world and make it otherwise not worse than the current American offering, I strongly doubt, they'll achieve the same quality and reliability reputation as the existing system.
Only the "true patriots" will use the Russian system, unless the government decides to (heavily) sponsor the devices using it and try to ban/tax/discourage the others (in blatant violation of the Free Trade commitments, of course).
Also, IIRC, you can buy wine on Sunday afternoons. I've never really cared enough to look into it.
You can now. You could not only a few years ago — until the 2004. Liquor stores were simply closed, stores offering both wines and foods (like Trader's Joe) weren't selling the wine-stock (just as I describe). Often they had the alcohol section completely blocked on Sundays, but not always, which lead to the confusion that I describe.
Easy, local customs. People like living in communities that share customs.
Nope, that's an invalid argument. A couple of centuries ago, it was a "local custom" to burn witches in this same state.
That is also why the Fed should stay out of legislating morality
Nobody should be legislating morality based on this example. Nobody. The argument you are applying to "the Fed" vs. the State, can just as easily be applied to the State vs. the town.
Once you can lose [windows or *nix or Mac] systems, for all intents & purposes, the IT infrastructure in question is near useless.
This presumes, the systems are always used in sequence (links in a chain), rather than in parallel (say, like a fishing net). This presumption is false.
For example, if half of a unit's desktops have to be shut down due to a particular flaw (in design or in implementation — does not matter) in their OS getting exploited by the enemy (or for some other reason, such as simply heat), the other half of the unit can still function.
If the military starts using them, it's only a matter of time until attackers hone their Mac skills and then the Army is right back to where it started, possibly even worse off because they evidently wouldn't see it coming.
Well, if they mix the OS-vendors like they (finally) mix aircraft-engine suppliers, it will be harder for an adversary to knock out all computers with the same (cyber-)attack. If a flow is found and/or exploited in some of the systems, they can be shut down and the same tasks performed on systems of (an)other type(s).
This argument — strength of diversity — floated here before...
The same goes for other forms of "vice" like alcohol or sex.
Try talking to a small US vineyard trying to sell to customers in other States.
I was once dumbfounded by it being illegal for me to buy a bottle of wine in Massachusetts on Sunday. As I stood there arguing with the cashier, a girl behind me in line (in early twenties, seemingly "progressive", and without a Bible under her arm) expressed her support for the law. It went something like: "Yeah, it is a good idea for there being one day a week, when buying alcohol is illegal. I like it."
She could not explain why and shut up, when I suggested, she avoids sex on Thursdays. But I remain puzzled, how a modern American can see fit to impose arbitrary and gratuitous limitations on others without a good and easily explainable reason.
Shouldn't there be some kind of client confidentiality involved here?
There are things, that even a lawyer is obligated to disclose about their client.
Really, am I the only one to remember, that in the pre-digital photo era there'd be a story every year of somebody getting into trouble after a technician in a photo-developing lab would notify police of questionable contents of the film submitted for development?
the dot it puts on the wall is very bright; my eyes ache if I look directly at it for more than a couple of seconds [...] That said, it's hardly a weapon and couldn't have caused the symptoms described in the article unless the pilot was looking directly down the beam for quite some time.
Well, if your eyes ache after only a few seconds of looking at the reflected dot created by the laser on the wall, it is not at all surprising, that the pilot's eyes began to ache immediately when hit directly by the beam.
I did not quite believe the police line either and thought, they exaggerated to secure the conviction of the pranksters "to send a message", but I'm becoming convinced by your own description...
The FreeBSD core team consists of 9 people, so losing 92% of them would mean losing 8.37 of them, which doesn't really make sense.
The loss of a single man — Matt Dillon, who went on to found DragonFlyBSD — was devastating. He is not only quite bright, but also energetic and somehow able to devote a lot of time to the open-source software development.
His being expelled — over an exasperated comment in a cvs-commit — was highly unfortunate in my not-so-humble opinion...
A team of ten MIT students powered a supercomputer [...] The system is low-powered and draws 1,200 watts without needing special power supplies or cooling.
Indeed, what's so special about a power-supply consisting of 10 MIT students? Nothing really...
Obviously, you aren't a developer. If you were, you'd know what they are dealing with.
Is it really "obvious"? Do me a favor, look me up on the Internet:) Start with the hostname part of my e-mail address.
Seriously, if you can make a mistake like this, it may explain some of the problems you are having supporting your customers...
Nowadays, I answer the phone politely but tersely, and I don't really bother to hide the fact that I have better things to do with my time. [emphasis mine -mi]
With a company producing proprietary software, you (the user) report the problem, the company sends you a form letter explaining that their software is flawless but thanking you for wasting their time anyways, and proceeding to ignore your report. If it happens to gets fixed in the next revision, it's entirely a coincidence.
As a matter of fact, I found the attitude to be completely independent of the software license. This is why you do not see me complaining/praising neither the open-source nor the "proprietary" software in my posting. There are responsible and quickly-reacting groups in both worlds, and there are groups, where the reported bugs are either denied, or ignored and let fester from release to release for years. The amount of latter-like ones seems growing, however, and that upsets me.
Yes, well, when dealing with the public on a regular basis, you will find that 90%+ of the time, the user is, in fact, doing something wrong, and assuming otherwise will waste absolutely all of your time.
I'd agree with Linux, but the Solaris code is often very, very clean.
Solaris kernel may be clean. Solaris' user-space programs, however, are a disaster. For example, even in the most-modern Solaris 10:
awk could still complain about "input line too long"
vi which would allow multiple editing sessions of the same file and, also, complain about "screen too wide"
the castrated/bin/sh (no wonder, Sun's own scripts use/bin/ksh!)
find, which does not have the -print0
make that can't parallelize jobs
no out-of-the-box locate
ftp-client has no line-history/editing
etc., etc., etc.
Maybe, all of these utilities have a really clean source, of course. Cleanliness is not sufficient, however — it is merely required. The common solution to the above-listed problems is to install GNU versions of the utilities — which brings in all that ugly-but-functional code we are complaining about... It is also done differently by every sysadmin, so portable scripts can't rely on it...
If you want out-of-the-box functionality and clean source code, you want a BSD operating system. Be that Net, Open, Free, or DragonFlyBSD. Or even MacOS.
What surprises me about the Firefox 3.0 beta is how many memory leaks that Mozilla have fixed. Complaints of memory leaks with Firefox 2.0 were met with an attitude of "Leaks? What leaks?"
This is really the worst part of modern software-development practices. When users complain about bugs, they are met with hostile demands to explain exactly, how to reproduce the bug, and the complainer is always presumed to be doing something wrong. Those, who aren't willing to put up with the hostility are not even deemed worthy of being a user — if you had a bug, you should've reported it!
But when a new release has (some of) the bugs fixed, the fixes are touted as a major leap forward. We are supposed to love the new version for all the fixes it includes — and ignore all the bugs, that the next version will be addressing...
Slashdot Mirror
There is nothing "imaginary" about intellectual property. It is the 21-st century and making most things is getting easier every year. Designing things remains hard.
But the fruits of the designer's labor are even easier to duplicate than to implement. Copying them without the creator's permission is just as immoral (and often illegal) as the traditional stealing is.
The submitter seems to imply, the non-tangible property is entirely "imaginary" and thus one can choose to "believe" in it — or not... He also links to a page of a perfectly respectable organization, which has nothing in common with his inflammatory "name"...
- Start holding your breath now.
- Post an example of an organization, that was declared "terrorist" by "this administration" without actually using terrorism as in:
Thank you.Thank you. For cleanliness you could have also retracted your dismissive:
I guess, that was a bit of an overstatement, was not it?
The argument, which you dismissed as "strawman", was that our existing (for years) GPS is superior to the Russian vaporware system. This superiority is a relevant counter-example to your above-quoted claim. This relevance makes you wrong thrice: 1) the original claim; 2) the dismissal of the counter-example as a "strawman"; 3) the insistance on it being a "strawman". Aren't you tired?
Well, start holding your breath now.
I know quite a bit more about Russia building anything than you and your father combined. They can build a space-craft, but they can not build a usable device. As the joke said, it will neither hum nor go where it is supposed to.
The quality of Soviet/Russian-made electronics sucks. You are talking about some awesome track-record, when, in fact, there is not any — not in the field of consumer-oriented space tech. All they have done before was done for the state's needs of prestige and military. And what little consumer electronics were made in Soviet times (none is made now), it was horrible. Not just subpar — horrible...
They may succeed this time, but I'm rather skeptical. If the world does get a GPS-alternative, it is far more likely that it will be a European one, although a sudden appearance of a Japanese or even a Chinese system can't be ruled out.
"In somewhat upgraded form" our spacecraft are also still flying. In fact, it is such a wonderful all-encompassing expression — "in somewhat upgraded form" — that, pretty much, everything qualifies... But thank you for granting the "technically impressive" bit. One could deduce from that, that US has beaten the Soviets' butt back then at least on something.
And the Soviets knew that, BTW — they would not even deny it. Back when the whole world was glued to their TV-screens watching in awe as the Americans were walking on the Moon, the Soviet TV-viewers were shown some old footage of ballet... This is something your father would not be able to tell you.
You also conveniently skipped our Mars explorers — do ask your father, how those are inferior to a Russian tractor or something and get back to me...
You may need a refresher, on what "straw man" means. You should also look up, what "kicking butt" means too — Russian GLONASS remains vaporware, and yet you refuse to submit, that even in the field of GPS (ubiquitously available for years) America is ahead of the Soviets/Russians.
Right. And when you grow up, you'll really-really kick that guy's ass. But today he is kicking yours...
Somehow I missed the news of the Soviets/Russians landing on the Moon, surveying Mars, and, to bring us back to the subject at hand, developing a reliable GPS technology (what we are discussing here, is a system with no practically usable devices yet, and covering only the territory of Russia itself).
Other than that, yes, they "have been kicking our asses in space technology". Sure...
Nope, that's the Chinese-made hummer. The Soviet-made would not even hum.
Russia really-really-really wants to join WTO.
Yes, it can. But then the WTO-members — all of whom have to approve every new would-be member — may get upset and one or two of them may go as far as veto Russia's entry into the organization.
And should Ukraine — or any other direct victim of Russia's meddling — join WTO before Russia, they will suddenly have serious defense against Russia's "profilactical" shenanigans with which the infamous "Prison of the Nations" is trying to rebuild its rotten empire.
But you will still fsck up there — and everywhere else in USSR — thanks to the deliberately incorrect Soviet maps :)
The joke went like this:
Now, Russia is not exactly like Soviet Union, but it is not entirely dissimilar either. So even if they do provide coverage for other parts of the world and make it otherwise not worse than the current American offering, I strongly doubt, they'll achieve the same quality and reliability reputation as the existing system.
Only the "true patriots" will use the Russian system, unless the government decides to (heavily) sponsor the devices using it and try to ban/tax/discourage the others (in blatant violation of the Free Trade commitments, of course).
You can now. You could not only a few years ago — until the 2004. Liquor stores were simply closed, stores offering both wines and foods (like Trader's Joe) weren't selling the wine-stock (just as I describe). Often they had the alcohol section completely blocked on Sundays, but not always, which lead to the confusion that I describe.
Nope, that's an invalid argument. A couple of centuries ago, it was a "local custom" to burn witches in this same state.
Nobody should be legislating morality based on this example. Nobody. The argument you are applying to "the Fed" vs. the State, can just as easily be applied to the State vs. the town.
This presumes, the systems are always used in sequence (links in a chain), rather than in parallel (say, like a fishing net). This presumption is false.
For example, if half of a unit's desktops have to be shut down due to a particular flaw (in design or in implementation — does not matter) in their OS getting exploited by the enemy (or for some other reason, such as simply heat), the other half of the unit can still function.
Well, if they mix the OS-vendors like they (finally) mix aircraft-engine suppliers, it will be harder for an adversary to knock out all computers with the same (cyber-)attack. If a flow is found and/or exploited in some of the systems, they can be shut down and the same tasks performed on systems of (an)other type(s).
This argument — strength of diversity — floated here before...
I was once dumbfounded by it being illegal for me to buy a bottle of wine in Massachusetts on Sunday. As I stood there arguing with the cashier, a girl behind me in line (in early twenties, seemingly "progressive", and without a Bible under her arm) expressed her support for the law. It went something like: "Yeah, it is a good idea for there being one day a week, when buying alcohol is illegal. I like it."
She could not explain why and shut up, when I suggested, she avoids sex on Thursdays. But I remain puzzled, how a modern American can see fit to impose arbitrary and gratuitous limitations on others without a good and easily explainable reason.
Just in case?
"Better safe than sorry," — murmured the abbess rolling a condom over a candle.
There are things, that even a lawyer is obligated to disclose about their client.
Really, am I the only one to remember, that in the pre-digital photo era there'd be a story every year of somebody getting into trouble after a technician in a photo-developing lab would notify police of questionable contents of the film submitted for development?
To make sure, the torture of cheerleaders is not uncovered. Or something...
Well, if your eyes ache after only a few seconds of looking at the reflected dot created by the laser on the wall, it is not at all surprising, that the pilot's eyes began to ache immediately when hit directly by the beam.
I did not quite believe the police line either and thought, they exaggerated to secure the conviction of the pranksters "to send a message", but I'm becoming convinced by your own description...
Captured on US soil or a US-citizen, for that matter...
The loss of a single man — Matt Dillon, who went on to found DragonFlyBSD — was devastating. He is not only quite bright, but also energetic and somehow able to devote a lot of time to the open-source software development.
His being expelled — over an exasperated comment in a cvs-commit — was highly unfortunate in my not-so-humble opinion...
Indeed, what's so special about a power-supply consisting of 10 MIT students? Nothing really...
Is it really "obvious"? Do me a favor, look me up on the Internet :) Start with the hostname part of my e-mail address.
Seriously, if you can make a mistake like this, it may explain some of the problems you are having supporting your customers...
Thank you for illustrating my point.
As a matter of fact, I found the attitude to be completely independent of the software license. This is why you do not see me complaining/praising neither the open-source nor the "proprietary" software in my posting. There are responsible and quickly-reacting groups in both worlds, and there are groups, where the reported bugs are either denied, or ignored and let fester from release to release for years. The amount of latter-like ones seems growing, however, and that upsets me.
Thank you for illustrating my point.
Solaris kernel may be clean. Solaris' user-space programs, however, are a disaster. For example, even in the most-modern Solaris 10:
Maybe, all of these utilities have a really clean source, of course. Cleanliness is not sufficient, however — it is merely required. The common solution to the above-listed problems is to install GNU versions of the utilities — which brings in all that ugly-but-functional code we are complaining about... It is also done differently by every sysadmin, so portable scripts can't rely on it...
If you want out-of-the-box functionality and clean source code, you want a BSD operating system. Be that Net, Open, Free, or DragonFlyBSD. Or even MacOS.
This is really the worst part of modern software-development practices. When users complain about bugs, they are met with hostile demands to explain exactly, how to reproduce the bug, and the complainer is always presumed to be doing something wrong. Those, who aren't willing to put up with the hostility are not even deemed worthy of being a user — if you had a bug, you should've reported it!
But when a new release has (some of) the bugs fixed, the fixes are touted as a major leap forward. We are supposed to love the new version for all the fixes it includes — and ignore all the bugs, that the next version will be addressing...