Ubuntu 5.10 also provides images for installation from DVD. The DVD install image includes all supported packages, including those Not installed by default.
The combined install/live DVD allows you either to install Ubuntu permanently on a computer, or (by entering 'live' at the boot prompt) to try Ubuntu without changing your computer at all. There are three editions available:
That's like asking what's the better editor, Vi or the Gimp? It depends on what you intend to do!
If you want to ensure the source code will always be free/open, the GPL is the better licence.
If you want to make the software available for all to do with as they please, but retain copyright and credits, then the BSD licence is better.
If Linux were licensed under a BSD licence, Microsoft could simply take it and sell a modified version, without giving back to the community. With the GPL, they can take it and sell it, but also have to open their modifications so everyone can benefit from them.
The BSD licence is great for supporting software, though, for example a player for an open format (like Ogg Vorbis) to gain widespread adoption.
Ubuntu 5.04 now provides images for installation from DVD. The DVD install image includes all supported packages, including those Not installed by default.
The combined install/live DVD allows you either to install Ubuntu permanently on a computer, or (by entering 'live' at the boot prompt) to try Ubuntu without changing your computer at all. There are three images available, each for a different type of computer:
Perhaps relevant to many Slashdot readers is that scrutiny of payment-in-kind could affect online gaming participants who trade their time and skill for free access to servers and other resources.
Payment is meant as compensation. If you work for someone, you should get something back. Money is just one means of compensation, a generic means, replacing trading different kinds of wares.
When you play a free online game, you help the company by being part of the gaming community, the better the community the more gamers will be attracted. The more gamers play, the more games the company will sell. Should the gamers be paid? No, they are compensated in another way, the fun and community itself are their reward!
But if it's a pay-per-play system (like Ultima Online, EverQuest, etc.) - then you should NOT have to pay them for maintaining the servers! The servers are worthless compared to the community created by the players. If you have the servers without players, nobody would play, the players matter much more than the servers. In fact, if you play such a massive multiplayer game properly, you make it a better game for everybody. YOU should be paid for playing. Again, it doesn't have to be money, fun and entertainment are a great compensation. In our society, they are often more valuable than vital daily-life services - who's paid more: The guy who cleans up the trash or an actor? Pay-per-play just doesn't make sense, let them sell you the games once and keep the access free, while you promote their games by playing them online! They shouldn't pay the players money, but neither should the players pay for play, because without the players their games and servers are useless and worthless...
Although a lot of people, including RMS and ESR, apparently are opposed to the Free World Licence, it has its place among the "free" licences:
There's the "free without restrictions" type of licences, e.g. the BSD licence, which basically let you do what you want with the software, including distribution of binaries without providing source. You can integrate it into proprietary projects without opening up your changes. It's for idealists who want to give away their code without asking for others to contribute back their improvements.
Then there's the "free with restrictions" kind of licences, e.g. the GNU GPL, which also let you do what you want with the software, but forbids distribution of binaries without source. You can't take it without giving back your changes. It's for pragmatists who want to give away their code while making sure it will remain free for all.
And now there's the "free only on free systems" licence, the Free World Licence, which is only free in the free parts of the software world. It's not Open Source because it's discrimination against non-free platforms which violates the Open Source Guidelines. However, it's useful for those who want to provide free software for users of free operating systems, but not to proprietary systems.
All three try to support Free Software in their own way. So which one is best? That's up to you, the creator of the software will choose whichever licence fits to their ideology best, and all are good at what they want to do! And in the Free Software World, there are more ways than one, as we all know...
(Or at least should know - never mind the flamewars, they are just a little drawback, the bright side is Freedom of Choice.)
Finally there's a Windows version of Gecko. I was quite excited about the Gecko project when I heard about it, but since it didn't have a Windows port, I am still using Netscape right now. I've been tempted to switch to Internet Explorer regularly, whenever a website didn't work properly, but I hesitated because I knew both browsers are too proprietary. Now that Gecko is out, I can finally switch to an open source and standards compliant webbrowser.
I think this is what Mozilla should have done, instead of continuing to work on their big project, they should first have released such a light-weight stand-alone browser. I'm not saying the rest is bloat, not at all, and I'm faithfully waiting for Mozilla's public release. But until then, Netscape keeps sucking, and Internet Explorer keeps expanding. The first step should have been to provide a working browser, fully standards-compliant, and after that the rest could follow.
Thanks to open source development, someone else was able to do it. One thing I'd like to say is that open source development is very ambitious. But to come out of the obscurity, something has to be released to the public, a working version with all features ready. I've tried Mozilla's preview releases, but what I need right now is just a browser. Once such a browser is done, people could start to use it, and spread it around. Then, while the user base is constantly growing, the rest of the project could be implemented. Otherwise it's too little, too late. It's better to have something, and early.
If gamers want to be taken seriously, we need to acknowledge that not all games should be played by everyone. [...] By clinging to the notion that all games should be available for everyone, we're forcing developers to only create games that can be sold to anyone -- i.e., kid-friendly games. With a ratings system in place, game manufacturers have the freedom to develop games for any age level, [...]
At first glance, it looks like it might work like this, which would be a good thing. But in reality, it's probably different. Some family-oriented places don't offer restricted media, and if a game gets such a rating, it might not be for sale there. If it's a big shop like Best Buy, EB, etc., the impact on sales would be big. Big enough to make publishers force developers to dumb down their games for kids.
Right now, games are designed for a target audience, and released for everyone to buy. Kids and adults alike. If adult games are only available to adults, while kid games are available to adults and kids, the kid games will be more profitable. Instead of Quake 3: Arena, you'd only get a Nerf ArenaBlast, for example.
With games being ported on more and more different platforms, the whole gaming industry should learn to make games portable. It doesn't really matter if it's an in-house group of external company who does the porting. It benefits all consumers since ports mean less product lock-in and exclusives. Let's hope this continues and gets expected instead of special.
By the way, this shows very well how Linux is the foremost open source OS, but not the only one. While Linux/X86 is getting the goodies first, once they are there, they can be easily made available to the other systems as well. Even if the other markets are smaller, the smaller the effort, the easier and faster it will happen. Standardization is good.
All of a sudden anyone could attribute any quote to your work by just reving the docutment.
Of course not. The author of a particular change is always responsible for that change, they can't just call their changed version the same with a different version number, they can only make a derivative work which is also under the GPL but they are the responsible "owner". That means they only own their own parts for which they are responsible while the rest is unchanged. The original creator and owner of the original has nothing to do with their changes. That should be obvious.
If it was different, Microsoft could just rewrite the latest Linux kernel as a Visual Basic/Virus Builder script, and claim Linus Torvalds and the Linux community to be responsible for the next Outlook problem...;)
Richard Parsons, the president of Time Warner Inc., is quoted as saying, "An increasing number of young people don't buy albums, so we are not only losing that immediate revenue. They are growing up with a notion that music is free and ought to be free."
The parent is right. If you want freedom of speech online, and advertising is speech, then what the hell are you thinking? How can you think that Spammers should all be attacked, and made illegal, when you think that DeCSS should be free, because it is speech? I, personally, am for DeCSS. I am also 'pro-spam'. I think that spammers have the right to spam as much as you have the right to post a DeCSS mirror.
This should be common sense, but since that's such an uncommon thing, here's an explanation of the obvious:
Spam is unsolicitated commercial email sent to countless people who never asked for it. If you want to post it on your website, as real advertisement, nobody should be able to stop you. But if you keep sending it to others who don't want it, then you should be stopped, you can't abuse freedom of speech to harass others. If DeCSS was sent by mail to lots of people, the spammer who does it should be stopped, but DeCSS itself isn't the problem. Spam isn't a problem, either, only the spammers.
So Napster has been shut down. This is a good time to rant a bit about it. We all know it used to be the easiest way to download pop music. Some see it as stealing, a loss of money for the artists and recording companies, and users are called pirates. Since I've been thinking about these things for some time now, I'll publish my opinions, hopefully it will make others think and reconsider.
Napster is a leech, the company created a program to exchange music, and the most popular kind of music is the mainstream pop music. Since it's so easy to do, a lot of people used it, getting their favorite music for free. However, there's some benefit for others, too. Independent artists could use it to distribute their own music to a broader audience. The record labels probably made additional money on sales of music that people discovered by chance on the net. A lot of artists must have made new fans because of the free availability of their music. Of course, the Napster company is just a corporation, their only real goal being to make a profit. So while their system has had several good side effects, they're not the good guys, just another business. There are no real ethics for corporations, only the bottom line counts, so they are neither better nor worse than the RIA. They were just "better" for their users.
Yet the free exchange of music, or any copyrighted material, has nothing to do with Napster. There's a lot of other possibilities, and since Napster was just another company, it's actually good that they were shut down. Now their users will move on to other services, most notably Gnutella, and the file exchange will be promoted even more. The end of Napster is the beginning of other similar systems, without the disadvantage of a central corporation and centralized servers, so there won't be any way of destroying them by stopping any one party. Napster was merely a first step, the introduction to the future, and now the real stuff will commence.
As a producer of intellectual property, I want to express my opinion on copyright and piracy, honestly and frankly. Claiming that Napster's main use was to spread indy artist music is a lie, but the same applies to claiming its users were pirates, both are merely propaganda claims. Pirates are assaulters who murder and rape people on the sea, not people who copy some files, calling the latter "pirates" is blowing things out of proportion. It's not even stealing, theft means taking something away from somebody else, but by making a copy the original isn't taken away from anyone. One could say you take away the profit of the ones who try to sell it if you distribute a copy for free, but even that isn't really right, most wouldn't buy it anyway. If you really appreciate something, and want to pay for it to show your appreciation, then you'd buy it from the creator. Unless the creator (or their distributor) demands too much. Let's face it, you can get almost anything on the net for free, but songs/movies/games are still getting paid for. And if you don't like something, why would you actually get and keep it, that's not necessary. So my point is that as long as the price is reasonable, those who appreciate the product will pay for it, and those who don't care won't get it anyway. There's no loss of profit. As an example, I'd always get an original version of my favorite song/movie/game to thank the creator, no matter how easy it is to get a free copy. Even if copy and original are identical.
If you look around my website, you can see a lot of intellectual property that I created all by myself, and thus own. I am all for copyright. The only person to profit from your creation should be yourself. But once you gained the profit, the copy should be owned by the buyer, no matter if it's real or intellectual property. The difference is that intellectual property can be copied without degradation, any digital copy will always be identical to the original, it's impossible to distinguish them from each other. So the solution is to change copyright laws, they should only apply to how others can distribute your product for commercial gain, but not non-profit distribution among individuals. They should never apply to personal usage or modification. So when you buy something, it's yours to keep and use any way you want to, as long as you don't make a profit off of it by distributing copies and competing with the original. Also, copyrights should expire a lot faster, so the intellectual property becomes part of the public domain in a more reasonable period of time.
Right now, the movie contained on a DVD you bought won't become public domain before the DVD medium itself will have "died of old age", and the corporate producer of such a DVD tries to make sure it can't be accessed in any other way. Sure, there's DeCSS to decrypt the encrypted contents from the disk to your harddisk, but even that is considered of similar legality as Napster. The thing is, don't think about now, think about the future. If things don't change, all cultural things (music, movies, games) will be access-restricted and copy-controlled, so you buy a license to access and use the contents in a limited way instead of full control by really owning the copy. We'd lose our cultural heritage, popular culture and the past would be controlled by the few companies who hold the copyright, and there's no intellectual property we could actually use freely. The creators have a right to make a profit, but we as consumers must make sure our right of fair use remains, too. Once you have paid for something, you should be the owner of that thing, and be able to use and modify it freely. Of course, you shouldn't be able to compete with the creator by selling copies of your own copy, so that's the balance our laws have to reach to benefit both producers and consumers. And, we're on both sides, after all.
Being a creator of intellectual property, I put my copyright notice on most of my stuff, and it's still implied if I don't. That applies to this message, too, I wrote it so I'm the only one who owns it. You can't legally make a copy and claim it's yours. You can't even make a derivative work and distribute it as your own. But of course nothing can prevent you from copying it, modifying it, keeping it. Or sending it to other individuals. I couldn't control that, and there's no reason I should have to, so as long as you don't make a profit off of it you're free to use it any way you want to. After some time, enough time for me to profit off of it, it should become public domain. Personally I believe that public domain works should keep credits to the original authors, so you can't claim authorship of a literal copy, although you own it as does anyone else. The most important thing is that it becomes free, unrestricted, liberated.
Most if not all creation consists of a collection of other works. As a popular example, Star Wars is based on a lot of different stories and legends, all public domain. So while it's a derivative work of public domain stuff, others can't use it as a base for their own works, for a very long time. If the respective laws keep progressing at the current pace, we're talking about centuries here, not just years. That's too long, not reasonable for any person, and only useful to maintain ownership by corporations. In my opinion, that's totally wrong, companies should never take precedence over people. Society comes first. Our culture must be preserved. It shouldn't be owned and controlled by soulless entities.
So, to sum up my essay, here's a simple sentence to explain what has to be done to ensure our cultural heritage and freedom: "Copyright should only control distribution for a profit - not any non-profit access/modification/usage!" -- Eavy, Saturday, 29. July 2000
If you have lots of dumb clients, and only a central server that is authoritative, cheating can be limited a lot. You can require unique CD keys to make sure a player has bought (or really stolen - not just copied) the game, and can only connect once, not several times. You can store all user data (stats, characters, etc.) on the server.
But I don't like that approach. It might eliminate cheating, but it will limit playing, too. CD keys make it impossible to share the game with your family and/or use it on several PC's you own. Central storage makes it impossible to keep the character for yourself. You own it, but you don't. If some crackers take down the central servers, nobody can play, and you might lose your characters. There's no way to make a backup. And if the company goes out of business or just ceases support for the game (pretty likely when the successor is released - or the successor's successor), then the game will be dead, no way to play over the net anymore. If it's an online-only game, it's gone for good, unless they release a final patch to get rid of those limitations.
It's also about heritage, and gaming culture, will we be able to keep our games? I can still go back and play the games I bought over a decade ago. We should make sure the same can be said about the games we buy today!
So my opinion is: Don't accept the limitations. If the limitations are necessary, only accept them if they will be removed after the game's life ends. If we as the customers don't object to the restrictions placed on our games, the companies will restrict them further, obviously hurting consumers. Pay-per-play is especially bad, because once you stop paying, you'll eventually lose everything you did pay for before...
Sounds like you already accepted the "inevitable"? Then you already lost! Keep in mind that the people who give up hope lose any chance they might have had. So don't just say it's over already, no, continue the fight. I say it's "inevitable" that individual freedom will win.
He who says it cannot be done should not interrupt a man doing it.
Re:About Quake3's serial numbers....
on
Copyrant
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· Score: 2
John,
I was planning to buy the Linux Elite Edition of Quake 3: Arena, but when I found out about the copy-protection (no, wait, access-limitation!), I decided to boycott the game. CD checks are simply annoying, the warez doods always use cracked versions so it only affects legitimate customers, who either put up with the annoyances or get a crack which can be dangerous. The CD key checks are dangerous, too, because I don't want to invest my money into a product I can't have guaranteed access to. The keys are just an incentive for others to try to break into your PC and grab the key, then the legitimate customer is locked out, and the key is published on warez pages. I'd have bought Q3A if you promised to remove the CD key check with a patch, and if the CD authentication would default to accept instead of deny when the server are down, but as it was I didn't have enough proof that it worked like that. Instead I bought UT and it was the best game purchase I ever made. I'd have bought Q3A, too, but because of the copy/access-protection I didn't - so you see that the protection measures do hurt sales...
Upon looking at Stallman's own views, I still fail to see how licensing your work "deprives" people. Ford isn't "depriving" people of transportation by demanding that you pay money for one of their cars. If you cant afford it, that's your problem, not Ford's. How is this evil? The whole thing smells a little weird.
Nice car analogy - because it's easy to show its flaws:
If Ford would license their cars, they could dictate to you how you use your (no, wait, it's only licensed - it would still be THEIR) car. You must not open it to look at the engine. You must not transport anyone else. You must not lend it to others. And if you could make a copy, you'd only be allowed to make a one for backup purposes, if you're really lucky (and able to circumvent the copy protection). Oh, and if it has a problem, you have to take it back to the manufacturer - you can't just ask a mechanic to fix it (or try fixing it yourself). And so on...
As has been pointed out already, it's not about "free" as in "no cost", it's all about "free" as in "what you're free to do" with it!
You took that page away from them? They lost it? They can no longer access their original? If they still have their own, you didn't steal it, you made a copy!
When people mix up hackers and crackers, some correct them. When they mix up free software and open source, some correct them. When they mix up virii and viruses, some correct them. It might seem pedantic to do it all the time, but it's the only way to work against the propaganda, so comparing copying to theft or even piracy (i.e. murder, rape, slavery) should be corrected with an outcry immediately as well...
So I suggest we use the proper words when going against their propaganda so we won't strengthen their position in the public opinion to make sure people notice the difference and exaggerating.
When I buy a program, I tend to think I'm paying for manual, box, and customer support. I don't use customer support (looking for help on the net is much more efficient) so that's not a reason to buy stuff. I also make backups of the original media so I can archive the media in a secure place and use the expendable copies. That's why the media itself isn't worth the money, either, so only packaging and manuals remain. I collect the boxes and read the manuals so even if I could get the software for free (it's always available online - somewhere), I'd rather buy the original, so I have docs and box. Reading the manual is often necessary, at least beneficial since you can read about things that are not "intuitive" to figure out, so having access to the docs is important enough for me to buy the software I use. And if some piece of software is so simple that you don't need a manual, then it's an obvious program that should be part of the OS, not a stand-alone package that you have to pay for extra. Even easy-to-use applications like games make use of manuals, and if it's so easy that there's no need for a manual, then add a strategy guide and walk-through. And some other stuff, cool gimmicks, something you can only get by buying the originals. That rewards legit customers instead of punishing them when they buy copy-protected software. Since software distribution is free over the Internet, and commercial software you buy is often restricted in many ways, there should be a real incentive to buy the originals and provide things that can't be downloaded for free. Think about it.
Well, I'm one of the few who want to know what's going on, to watch closely what an installer is doing to the system. I don't like Windows setup procedures where the only user interaction is asking if they accept the stupid EULA, then some filenames (if any information is displayed at all) rush over the screen, and then the thing is done (probably after a reboot). On the other hand, it's still better than some Linux installations, where I have to compile first and often download additional files (so I get a small package, great, until I realize I need a dozen of required library packages or whatever). Anyhow, when I'm really anxious to play a game, I'd not like to be bothered by some other stuff (like OS mechanisms). I want to get the thing installed, fast (but still be in control of the procedure - at least ask if I want Desktop shortcuts), without any distractions (no, do not install trailers for other stuff, I only want what I install myself). In the end, the KISS approach is probably best, and even if it places shortcuts on my Desktop I can live with it. It's better to have powerusers remove it manually than force newbies to look for the file and place desktops on their own. It might be a pitty, but let's face it, the times when people knew and managed exactly what was stored (and where it was) on their harddisks are over. Just like most of us computer geeks have not much of a clue regarding car engines, and it's already hard enough to pick the proper type of fuel, if all you want to do is drive somewhere. And admit it, you don't care about how it works, as long as it takes you where you want to go. Different people have different interests and priorities.
"If I'm not stealing, i.e. taking something away from somebody so they lose it, AND not making a profit (i.e. publishing, performing, or redistributing it to make a win) that's not shared with the original owner, I'm not a pirate; I might not be an owner, but a user, and this is morally fine with me."
Pay-to-Play is an issue that's very important to me. UltimaOnline & EverQuest are setting a precedent for massive-multiplayer-games, a dangerous precedent, since most types of games are moving towards that direction. Digital Extremes, who made Unreal Tournament with Epic Games, are working on such a game as well. Many more will certainly follow. Will we have to pay regular charges for all of those future games? They might be online-play only!
The obvious advantages for gamemakers are a steady income even after the game has been released, hardly any problems with warez (the game itself only works with a valid account), and full control over the game (central administration of the servers). They are in charge and charge the players.
Some say they should make the game free and only have us pay for the actual time we play. Charging full price for the game plus regular fees seems too excessive. But I tend to think that even charging for playing time only gets excessive. I like to compare that to the Internet itself. In Europe, we often have no flat rate access, we have to pay regular fees plus the time we're online. Now you can argue that ISP's need to maintain a lot of date and servers, take AOL as an example, but would you actually agree to have time-based pricing? To you, a flatrate might be as natural as breathing air for free, but it can be argued just as well! So for a lot of Europeans, we still would have to pay regular fees for phone bills, Internet access, plus online games - each costs just a bit, but the bits add up, so it simply becomes too expensive. That's why we, the consumers, should always try to move to fair flat rate access...
There's another thing, something a lot of people don't seem to consider at all, time and energy. That's money, too, and more important to an online game than regular charges could ever be. Players invest a lot of time and energy to play and have fun. Without other human players, any online game would suck, bots and NPCs can't substitute real people playing. By playing properly, you are having fun, and increasing the fun of the other players. That makes the game more fun and interesting, so people will play more, and more people will buy the game. A nice player is worth more than a fancy feature of the software. In the end, it's all about people, that's what matters. People who invest their time should be valued accordingly! Why don't players get paid? Instead of charging us, they should pay us... Especially since we don't really own our characters and property, it's virtual, stored on their servers. If they ever close shop, all my stuff will be gone, I can't just keep it. Combine that with the usual disclaimers and EULAs and you pay a lot for something that in the end will be nothing.
I see why they charge for upkeep and enhancements, but I also see why we could charge them for playing, so I believe this balances out and nobody should pay or charge. If they really need to make more money, they should place some ads in-game, in a way that makes sense and fits to the game. It's possible and would work just like it does with websites. Actually it could work even better if a company would have a virtual subsidiary inside the game world and you could stop by and buy stuff without leaving the game. Lots of possibilities.
Well, personally I'd love to play such a massive multiplayer game, but out of principle I won't pay for it as I just explained. I'll have to wait until a free one comes along. And I really hope it will be free as in speech as well, open-source so I know it will be reliable and can be kept compatible, we'd not risk losing our characters. Current projects like WorldForge look promising, but are still not ready, not yet. Let's wait and see what comes along...
Finally, something about game prices: A game like Unreal Tournament is cheap. Even if it would cost $100 or more, it would still be cheap. Its replayability is immense, and once you start getting tired of something, just download some mods or maps and it's all new and fresh again. I think that the actual game prices are too low but regular charges are too high. I wouldn't mind to pay $100 and get free play forever. I would mind paying nothing for the software but $10 per month. I own my copy of UT, but in a regular-fee-game, the software alone would be useless. Besides, I'd like to run my own server, for LAN games and such.
Speaking of that, this reminds me of an interesting idea I had: Don't run central servers on a few machines, run small clients on lots of PCs. Just like SETI@home, encrypt the date, and make it very redundant. If this is done properly, the small PCs would help out the few central servers, and load would get balanced accordingly. That combined with appropriate in-game advertisement should help pay the bills of our hosts.
There is always another way. They are only charging regular fees because people apparently pay. If nobody played and told them it's because of their pricing scheme, they would definitely change their mind. So far, they have no reason to consider a change, there are enough people who pay to play without thinking about it. It's a pitty, but I assume it will work out like it did with Internet access, first the high regular charges until times change and we see flatrate access coming up. Time shall tell...
When I was at Uni, I got into some moderate trouble for mailing on a copy of the 1000 question Purity Test to a few friends. I didn't object: those computers, that network infrastructure, they were paid for so that we (the students) could use them for education -- not so we could exchange lighthearted smut.
I can understand getting in trouble for forwarding crap (the usual spam, chain-mails, etc.) - but only by those who you forward it to. If you didn't send the purity test to the admins and none of your friends complained to them about it, how did they find out? If they read your e-mail, then I'd say this is something you really should object to!
My (un?!)educated guess is that this "Larry" is just an automated IQ test program. Kind of a Slashdot purity control. The gullible who fall for it will be eliminated by immediate redirection to a mainstream site. This is just one of several clean-up programs that work for the self-proclaimed Slashdot elite. Other efforts like that have been witnessed right here, for example the Prude-Exterminator, making prudish people leave because they are offended by ASCII tits. Now, to contribute to that endeavour, here's some ASCII art of a penis.
Education is all about learning. Learning happens from a perspetive. That being said, I'd rather have the third graders learning from a well educated and consientious elementary school teacher than their telivision. If you want to call that brainwashing, so be it. I don't see a thing wrong with it.
The goal of learning is understanding. To understand something, you must know both sides of the issue. Getting fixed on only one perspective as the ultimate while ignoring others is being brainwashed.
It's too easy to bring naive people (and third graders are gullible) on your side if that's all they get told. If you want to teach them, you'll educate them so they can decide on their own, that's what a teacher should be doing. Only discussing one side and making them follow you there blindly is brainwashing.
Personally, I don't think schools are supposed to educate people so they can decide on their own and think critically, it's more like forcing them to conform and adapt to the current social rules. All healthy children are inquisitive and curious, until they go to school, then they often start to hate it.
Slashdot Mirror
The combined install/live DVD allows you either to install Ubuntu permanently on a computer, or (by entering 'live' at the boot prompt) to try Ubuntu without changing your computer at all. There are three editions available:
Ubuntu 5.10 (Breezy Badger)
Kubuntu 5.10 (Breezy Badger)
Edubuntu 5.10 (Breezy Badger)
Please download using Bittorrent if possible.
That's like asking what's the better editor, Vi or the Gimp? It depends on what you intend to do!
If you want to ensure the source code will always be free/open, the GPL is the better licence.
If you want to make the software available for all to do with as they please, but retain copyright and credits, then the BSD licence is better.
If Linux were licensed under a BSD licence, Microsoft could simply take it and sell a modified version, without giving back to the community. With the GPL, they can take it and sell it, but also have to open their modifications so everyone can benefit from them.
The BSD licence is great for supporting software, though, for example a player for an open format (like Ogg Vorbis) to gain widespread adoption.
So think before you choose a licence...
Ubuntu 5.04 now provides images for installation from DVD. The DVD install image includes all supported packages, including those Not installed by default.
Ubuntu 5.04 (Hoary Hedgehog) Install/live DVD
The combined install/live DVD allows you either to install Ubuntu permanently on a computer, or (by entering 'live' at the boot prompt) to try Ubuntu without changing your computer at all. There are three images available, each for a different type of computer:
Install/live DVD for AMD64 computers (BitTorrent download)
Install/live DVD for Intel x86 computers (BitTorrent download)
Install/live DVD for PowerPC computers (BitTorrent download)
Payment is meant as compensation. If you work for someone, you should get something back. Money is just one means of compensation, a generic means, replacing trading different kinds of wares.
When you play a free online game, you help the company by being part of the gaming community, the better the community the more gamers will be attracted. The more gamers play, the more games the company will sell. Should the gamers be paid? No, they are compensated in another way, the fun and community itself are their reward!
But if it's a pay-per-play system (like Ultima Online, EverQuest, etc.) - then you should NOT have to pay them for maintaining the servers! The servers are worthless compared to the community created by the players. If you have the servers without players, nobody would play, the players matter much more than the servers. In fact, if you play such a massive multiplayer game properly, you make it a better game for everybody. YOU should be paid for playing. Again, it doesn't have to be money, fun and entertainment are a great compensation. In our society, they are often more valuable than vital daily-life services - who's paid more: The guy who cleans up the trash or an actor? Pay-per-play just doesn't make sense, let them sell you the games once and keep the access free, while you promote their games by playing them online! They shouldn't pay the players money, but neither should the players pay for play, because without the players their games and servers are useless and worthless...
Although a lot of people, including RMS and ESR, apparently are opposed to the Free World Licence, it has its place among the "free" licences:
There's the "free without restrictions" type of licences, e.g. the BSD licence, which basically let you do what you want with the software, including distribution of binaries without providing source. You can integrate it into proprietary projects without opening up your changes. It's for idealists who want to give away their code without asking for others to contribute back their improvements.
Then there's the "free with restrictions" kind of licences, e.g. the GNU GPL, which also let you do what you want with the software, but forbids distribution of binaries without source. You can't take it without giving back your changes. It's for pragmatists who want to give away their code while making sure it will remain free for all.
And now there's the "free only on free systems" licence, the Free World Licence, which is only free in the free parts of the software world. It's not Open Source because it's discrimination against non-free platforms which violates the Open Source Guidelines. However, it's useful for those who want to provide free software for users of free operating systems, but not to proprietary systems.
All three try to support Free Software in their own way. So which one is best? That's up to you, the creator of the software will choose whichever licence fits to their ideology best, and all are good at what they want to do! And in the Free Software World, there are more ways than one, as we all know...
(Or at least should know - never mind the flamewars, they are just a little drawback, the bright side is Freedom of Choice.)
Finally there's a Windows version of Gecko. I was quite excited about the Gecko project when I heard about it, but since it didn't have a Windows port, I am still using Netscape right now. I've been tempted to switch to Internet Explorer regularly, whenever a website didn't work properly, but I hesitated because I knew both browsers are too proprietary. Now that Gecko is out, I can finally switch to an open source and standards compliant webbrowser.
I think this is what Mozilla should have done, instead of continuing to work on their big project, they should first have released such a light-weight stand-alone browser. I'm not saying the rest is bloat, not at all, and I'm faithfully waiting for Mozilla's public release. But until then, Netscape keeps sucking, and Internet Explorer keeps expanding. The first step should have been to provide a working browser, fully standards-compliant, and after that the rest could follow.
Thanks to open source development, someone else was able to do it. One thing I'd like to say is that open source development is very ambitious. But to come out of the obscurity, something has to be released to the public, a working version with all features ready. I've tried Mozilla's preview releases, but what I need right now is just a browser. Once such a browser is done, people could start to use it, and spread it around. Then, while the user base is constantly growing, the rest of the project could be implemented. Otherwise it's too little, too late. It's better to have something, and early.
At first glance, it looks like it might work like this, which would be a good thing. But in reality, it's probably different. Some family-oriented places don't offer restricted media, and if a game gets such a rating, it might not be for sale there. If it's a big shop like Best Buy, EB, etc., the impact on sales would be big. Big enough to make publishers force developers to dumb down their games for kids.
Right now, games are designed for a target audience, and released for everyone to buy. Kids and adults alike. If adult games are only available to adults, while kid games are available to adults and kids, the kid games will be more profitable. Instead of Quake 3: Arena, you'd only get a Nerf ArenaBlast, for example.
This is great news indeed!
With games being ported on more and more different platforms, the whole gaming industry should learn to make games portable. It doesn't really matter if it's an in-house group of external company who does the porting. It benefits all consumers since ports mean less product lock-in and exclusives. Let's hope this continues and gets expected instead of special.
By the way, this shows very well how Linux is the foremost open source OS, but not the only one. While Linux/X86 is getting the goodies first, once they are there, they can be easily made available to the other systems as well. Even if the other markets are smaller, the smaller the effort, the easier and faster it will happen. Standardization is good.
Of course not. The author of a particular change is always responsible for that change, they can't just call their changed version the same with a different version number, they can only make a derivative work which is also under the GPL but they are the responsible "owner". That means they only own their own parts for which they are responsible while the rest is unchanged. The original creator and owner of the original has nothing to do with their changes. That should be obvious.
If it was different, Microsoft could just rewrite the latest Linux kernel as a Visual Basic/Virus Builder script, and claim Linus Torvalds and the Linux community to be responsible for the next Outlook problem... ;)
Music wants to be free! ;-)
The parent is right. If you want freedom of speech online, and advertising is speech, then what the hell are you thinking? How can you think that Spammers should all be attacked, and made illegal, when you think that DeCSS should be free, because it is speech? I, personally, am for DeCSS. I am also 'pro-spam'. I think that spammers have the right to spam as much as you have the right to post a DeCSS mirror.
This should be common sense, but since that's such an uncommon thing, here's an explanation of the obvious:
Spam is unsolicitated commercial email sent to countless people who never asked for it. If you want to post it on your website, as real advertisement, nobody should be able to stop you. But if you keep sending it to others who don't want it, then you should be stopped, you can't abuse freedom of speech to harass others. If DeCSS was sent by mail to lots of people, the spammer who does it should be stopped, but DeCSS itself isn't the problem. Spam isn't a problem, either, only the spammers.
So Napster has been shut down. This is a good time to rant a bit about it. We all know it used to be the easiest way to download pop music. Some see it as stealing, a loss of money for the artists and recording companies, and users are called pirates. Since I've been thinking about these things for some time now, I'll publish my opinions, hopefully it will make others think and reconsider.
Napster is a leech, the company created a program to exchange music, and the most popular kind of music is the mainstream pop music. Since it's so easy to do, a lot of people used it, getting their favorite music for free. However, there's some benefit for others, too. Independent artists could use it to distribute their own music to a broader audience. The record labels probably made additional money on sales of music that people discovered by chance on the net. A lot of artists must have made new fans because of the free availability of their music. Of course, the Napster company is just a corporation, their only real goal being to make a profit. So while their system has had several good side effects, they're not the good guys, just another business. There are no real ethics for corporations, only the bottom line counts, so they are neither better nor worse than the RIA. They were just "better" for their users.
Yet the free exchange of music, or any copyrighted material, has nothing to do with Napster. There's a lot of other possibilities, and since Napster was just another company, it's actually good that they were shut down. Now their users will move on to other services, most notably Gnutella, and the file exchange will be promoted even more. The end of Napster is the beginning of other similar systems, without the disadvantage of a central corporation and centralized servers, so there won't be any way of destroying them by stopping any one party. Napster was merely a first step, the introduction to the future, and now the real stuff will commence.
As a producer of intellectual property, I want to express my opinion on copyright and piracy, honestly and frankly. Claiming that Napster's main use was to spread indy artist music is a lie, but the same applies to claiming its users were pirates, both are merely propaganda claims. Pirates are assaulters who murder and rape people on the sea, not people who copy some files, calling the latter "pirates" is blowing things out of proportion. It's not even stealing, theft means taking something away from somebody else, but by making a copy the original isn't taken away from anyone. One could say you take away the profit of the ones who try to sell it if you distribute a copy for free, but even that isn't really right, most wouldn't buy it anyway. If you really appreciate something, and want to pay for it to show your appreciation, then you'd buy it from the creator. Unless the creator (or their distributor) demands too much. Let's face it, you can get almost anything on the net for free, but songs/movies/games are still getting paid for. And if you don't like something, why would you actually get and keep it, that's not necessary. So my point is that as long as the price is reasonable, those who appreciate the product will pay for it, and those who don't care won't get it anyway. There's no loss of profit. As an example, I'd always get an original version of my favorite song/movie/game to thank the creator, no matter how easy it is to get a free copy. Even if copy and original are identical.
If you look around my website, you can see a lot of intellectual property that I created all by myself, and thus own. I am all for copyright. The only person to profit from your creation should be yourself. But once you gained the profit, the copy should be owned by the buyer, no matter if it's real or intellectual property. The difference is that intellectual property can be copied without degradation, any digital copy will always be identical to the original, it's impossible to distinguish them from each other. So the solution is to change copyright laws, they should only apply to how others can distribute your product for commercial gain, but not non-profit distribution among individuals. They should never apply to personal usage or modification. So when you buy something, it's yours to keep and use any way you want to, as long as you don't make a profit off of it by distributing copies and competing with the original. Also, copyrights should expire a lot faster, so the intellectual property becomes part of the public domain in a more reasonable period of time.
Right now, the movie contained on a DVD you bought won't become public domain before the DVD medium itself will have "died of old age", and the corporate producer of such a DVD tries to make sure it can't be accessed in any other way. Sure, there's DeCSS to decrypt the encrypted contents from the disk to your harddisk, but even that is considered of similar legality as Napster. The thing is, don't think about now, think about the future. If things don't change, all cultural things (music, movies, games) will be access-restricted and copy-controlled, so you buy a license to access and use the contents in a limited way instead of full control by really owning the copy. We'd lose our cultural heritage, popular culture and the past would be controlled by the few companies who hold the copyright, and there's no intellectual property we could actually use freely. The creators have a right to make a profit, but we as consumers must make sure our right of fair use remains, too. Once you have paid for something, you should be the owner of that thing, and be able to use and modify it freely. Of course, you shouldn't be able to compete with the creator by selling copies of your own copy, so that's the balance our laws have to reach to benefit both producers and consumers. And, we're on both sides, after all.
Being a creator of intellectual property, I put my copyright notice on most of my stuff, and it's still implied if I don't. That applies to this message, too, I wrote it so I'm the only one who owns it. You can't legally make a copy and claim it's yours. You can't even make a derivative work and distribute it as your own. But of course nothing can prevent you from copying it, modifying it, keeping it. Or sending it to other individuals. I couldn't control that, and there's no reason I should have to, so as long as you don't make a profit off of it you're free to use it any way you want to. After some time, enough time for me to profit off of it, it should become public domain. Personally I believe that public domain works should keep credits to the original authors, so you can't claim authorship of a literal copy, although you own it as does anyone else. The most important thing is that it becomes free, unrestricted, liberated.
Most if not all creation consists of a collection of other works. As a popular example, Star Wars is based on a lot of different stories and legends, all public domain. So while it's a derivative work of public domain stuff, others can't use it as a base for their own works, for a very long time. If the respective laws keep progressing at the current pace, we're talking about centuries here, not just years. That's too long, not reasonable for any person, and only useful to maintain ownership by corporations. In my opinion, that's totally wrong, companies should never take precedence over people. Society comes first. Our culture must be preserved. It shouldn't be owned and controlled by soulless entities.
So, to sum up my essay, here's a simple sentence to explain what has to be done to ensure our cultural heritage and freedom: "Copyright should only control distribution for a profit - not any non-profit access/modification/usage!" -- Eavy, Saturday, 29. July 2000
If you have lots of dumb clients, and only a central server that is authoritative, cheating can be limited a lot. You can require unique CD keys to make sure a player has bought (or really stolen - not just copied) the game, and can only connect once, not several times. You can store all user data (stats, characters, etc.) on the server.
But I don't like that approach. It might eliminate cheating, but it will limit playing, too. CD keys make it impossible to share the game with your family and/or use it on several PC's you own. Central storage makes it impossible to keep the character for yourself. You own it, but you don't. If some crackers take down the central servers, nobody can play, and you might lose your characters. There's no way to make a backup. And if the company goes out of business or just ceases support for the game (pretty likely when the successor is released - or the successor's successor), then the game will be dead, no way to play over the net anymore. If it's an online-only game, it's gone for good, unless they release a final patch to get rid of those limitations.
It's also about heritage, and gaming culture, will we be able to keep our games? I can still go back and play the games I bought over a decade ago. We should make sure the same can be said about the games we buy today!
So my opinion is: Don't accept the limitations. If the limitations are necessary, only accept them if they will be removed after the game's life ends. If we as the customers don't object to the restrictions placed on our games, the companies will restrict them further, obviously hurting consumers. Pay-per-play is especially bad, because once you stop paying, you'll eventually lose everything you did pay for before...
In conclusion, human testing is sometimes necessary, and we should force it upon the Amish.
No, to be fair, it should be forced upon those who want to force it upon others, they surely should see the necessarity and agree! Right?
Sounds like you already accepted the "inevitable"? Then you already lost! Keep in mind that the people who give up hope lose any chance they might have had. So don't just say it's over already, no, continue the fight. I say it's "inevitable" that individual freedom will win.
He who says it cannot be done should not interrupt a man doing it.
John,
I was planning to buy the Linux Elite Edition of Quake 3: Arena, but when I found out about the copy-protection (no, wait, access-limitation!), I decided to boycott the game. CD checks are simply annoying, the warez doods always use cracked versions so it only affects legitimate customers, who either put up with the annoyances or get a crack which can be dangerous. The CD key checks are dangerous, too, because I don't want to invest my money into a product I can't have guaranteed access to. The keys are just an incentive for others to try to break into your PC and grab the key, then the legitimate customer is locked out, and the key is published on warez pages. I'd have bought Q3A if you promised to remove the CD key check with a patch, and if the CD authentication would default to accept instead of deny when the server are down, but as it was I didn't have enough proof that it worked like that. Instead I bought UT and it was the best game purchase I ever made. I'd have bought Q3A, too, but because of the copy/access-protection I didn't - so you see that the protection measures do hurt sales...
Nice car analogy - because it's easy to show its flaws:
If Ford would license their cars, they could dictate to you how you use your (no, wait, it's only licensed - it would still be THEIR) car. You must not open it to look at the engine. You must not transport anyone else. You must not lend it to others. And if you could make a copy, you'd only be allowed to make a one for backup purposes, if you're really lucky (and able to circumvent the copy protection). Oh, and if it has a problem, you have to take it back to the manufacturer - you can't just ask a mechanic to fix it (or try fixing it yourself). And so on...
As has been pointed out already, it's not about "free" as in "no cost", it's all about "free" as in "what you're free to do" with it!
You took that page away from them? They lost it? They can no longer access their original? If they still have their own, you didn't steal it, you made a copy!
When people mix up hackers and crackers, some correct them. When they mix up free software and open source, some correct them. When they mix up virii and viruses, some correct them. It might seem pedantic to do it all the time, but it's the only way to work against the propaganda, so comparing copying to theft or even piracy (i.e. murder, rape, slavery) should be corrected with an outcry immediately as well...
So I suggest we use the proper words when going against their propaganda so we won't strengthen their position in the public opinion to make sure people notice the difference and exaggerating.
When I buy a program, I tend to think I'm paying for manual, box, and customer support. I don't use customer support (looking for help on the net is much more efficient) so that's not a reason to buy stuff. I also make backups of the original media so I can archive the media in a secure place and use the expendable copies. That's why the media itself isn't worth the money, either, so only packaging and manuals remain. I collect the boxes and read the manuals so even if I could get the software for free (it's always available online - somewhere), I'd rather buy the original, so I have docs and box. Reading the manual is often necessary, at least beneficial since you can read about things that are not "intuitive" to figure out, so having access to the docs is important enough for me to buy the software I use. And if some piece of software is so simple that you don't need a manual, then it's an obvious program that should be part of the OS, not a stand-alone package that you have to pay for extra. Even easy-to-use applications like games make use of manuals, and if it's so easy that there's no need for a manual, then add a strategy guide and walk-through. And some other stuff, cool gimmicks, something you can only get by buying the originals. That rewards legit customers instead of punishing them when they buy copy-protected software. Since software distribution is free over the Internet, and commercial software you buy is often restricted in many ways, there should be a real incentive to buy the originals and provide things that can't be downloaded for free. Think about it.
Well, I'm one of the few who want to know what's going on, to watch closely what an installer is doing to the system. I don't like Windows setup procedures where the only user interaction is asking if they accept the stupid EULA, then some filenames (if any information is displayed at all) rush over the screen, and then the thing is done (probably after a reboot). On the other hand, it's still better than some Linux installations, where I have to compile first and often download additional files (so I get a small package, great, until I realize I need a dozen of required library packages or whatever). Anyhow, when I'm really anxious to play a game, I'd not like to be bothered by some other stuff (like OS mechanisms). I want to get the thing installed, fast (but still be in control of the procedure - at least ask if I want Desktop shortcuts), without any distractions (no, do not install trailers for other stuff, I only want what I install myself). In the end, the KISS approach is probably best, and even if it places shortcuts on my Desktop I can live with it. It's better to have powerusers remove it manually than force newbies to look for the file and place desktops on their own. It might be a pitty, but let's face it, the times when people knew and managed exactly what was stored (and where it was) on their harddisks are over. Just like most of us computer geeks have not much of a clue regarding car engines, and it's already hard enough to pick the proper type of fuel, if all you want to do is drive somewhere. And admit it, you don't care about how it works, as long as it takes you where you want to go. Different people have different interests and priorities.
"If I'm not stealing, i.e. taking something away from somebody so they lose it, AND not making a profit (i.e. publishing, performing, or redistributing it to make a win) that's not shared with the original owner, I'm not a pirate; I might not be an owner, but a user, and this is morally fine with me."
Pay-to-Play is an issue that's very important to me. UltimaOnline & EverQuest are setting a precedent for massive-multiplayer-games, a dangerous precedent, since most types of games are moving towards that direction. Digital Extremes, who made Unreal Tournament with Epic Games, are working on such a game as well. Many more will certainly follow. Will we have to pay regular charges for all of those future games? They might be online-play only!
The obvious advantages for gamemakers are a steady income even after the game has been released, hardly any problems with warez (the game itself only works with a valid account), and full control over the game (central administration of the servers). They are in charge and charge the players.
Some say they should make the game free and only have us pay for the actual time we play. Charging full price for the game plus regular fees seems too excessive. But I tend to think that even charging for playing time only gets excessive. I like to compare that to the Internet itself. In Europe, we often have no flat rate access, we have to pay regular fees plus the time we're online. Now you can argue that ISP's need to maintain a lot of date and servers, take AOL as an example, but would you actually agree to have time-based pricing? To you, a flatrate might be as natural as breathing air for free, but it can be argued just as well! So for a lot of Europeans, we still would have to pay regular fees for phone bills, Internet access, plus online games - each costs just a bit, but the bits add up, so it simply becomes too expensive. That's why we, the consumers, should always try to move to fair flat rate access...
There's another thing, something a lot of people don't seem to consider at all, time and energy. That's money, too, and more important to an online game than regular charges could ever be. Players invest a lot of time and energy to play and have fun. Without other human players, any online game would suck, bots and NPCs can't substitute real people playing. By playing properly, you are having fun, and increasing the fun of the other players. That makes the game more fun and interesting, so people will play more, and more people will buy the game. A nice player is worth more than a fancy feature of the software. In the end, it's all about people, that's what matters. People who invest their time should be valued accordingly! Why don't players get paid? Instead of charging us, they should pay us... Especially since we don't really own our characters and property, it's virtual, stored on their servers. If they ever close shop, all my stuff will be gone, I can't just keep it. Combine that with the usual disclaimers and EULAs and you pay a lot for something that in the end will be nothing.
I see why they charge for upkeep and enhancements, but I also see why we could charge them for playing, so I believe this balances out and nobody should pay or charge. If they really need to make more money, they should place some ads in-game, in a way that makes sense and fits to the game. It's possible and would work just like it does with websites. Actually it could work even better if a company would have a virtual subsidiary inside the game world and you could stop by and buy stuff without leaving the game. Lots of possibilities.
Well, personally I'd love to play such a massive multiplayer game, but out of principle I won't pay for it as I just explained. I'll have to wait until a free one comes along. And I really hope it will be free as in speech as well, open-source so I know it will be reliable and can be kept compatible, we'd not risk losing our characters. Current projects like WorldForge look promising, but are still not ready, not yet. Let's wait and see what comes along...
Finally, something about game prices: A game like Unreal Tournament is cheap. Even if it would cost $100 or more, it would still be cheap. Its replayability is immense, and once you start getting tired of something, just download some mods or maps and it's all new and fresh again. I think that the actual game prices are too low but regular charges are too high. I wouldn't mind to pay $100 and get free play forever. I would mind paying nothing for the software but $10 per month. I own my copy of UT, but in a regular-fee-game, the software alone would be useless. Besides, I'd like to run my own server, for LAN games and such.
Speaking of that, this reminds me of an interesting idea I had: Don't run central servers on a few machines, run small clients on lots of PCs. Just like SETI@home, encrypt the date, and make it very redundant. If this is done properly, the small PCs would help out the few central servers, and load would get balanced accordingly. That combined with appropriate in-game advertisement should help pay the bills of our hosts.
There is always another way. They are only charging regular fees because people apparently pay. If nobody played and told them it's because of their pricing scheme, they would definitely change their mind. So far, they have no reason to consider a change, there are enough people who pay to play without thinking about it. It's a pitty, but I assume it will work out like it did with Internet access, first the high regular charges until times change and we see flatrate access coming up. Time shall tell...
When I was at Uni, I got into some moderate trouble for mailing on a copy of the 1000 question Purity Test to a few friends. I didn't object: those computers, that network infrastructure, they were paid for so that we (the students) could use them for education -- not so we could exchange lighthearted smut.
I can understand getting in trouble for forwarding crap (the usual spam, chain-mails, etc.) - but only by those who you forward it to. If you didn't send the purity test to the admins and none of your friends complained to them about it, how did they find out? If they read your e-mail, then I'd say this is something you really should object to!
My (un?!)educated guess is that this "Larry" is just an automated IQ test program. Kind of a Slashdot purity control. The gullible who fall for it will be eliminated by immediate redirection to a mainstream site. This is just one of several clean-up programs that work for the self-proclaimed Slashdot elite. Other efforts like that have been witnessed right here, for example the Prude-Exterminator, making prudish people leave because they are offended by ASCII tits. Now, to contribute to that endeavour, here's some ASCII art of a penis.
:-
The goal of learning is understanding. To understand something, you must know both sides of the issue. Getting fixed on only one perspective as the ultimate while ignoring others is being brainwashed.
It's too easy to bring naive people (and third graders are gullible) on your side if that's all they get told. If you want to teach them, you'll educate them so they can decide on their own, that's what a teacher should be doing. Only discussing one side and making them follow you there blindly is brainwashing.
Personally, I don't think schools are supposed to educate people so they can decide on their own and think critically, it's more like forcing them to conform and adapt to the current social rules. All healthy children are inquisitive and curious, until they go to school, then they often start to hate it.