When I was in school, in order to make the National Honor Society, we had to make a case for our acceptance into that august organization over and above our gradepoint average. I took the opportunity to tell them that I rejected their silly contest as elitist beauty pageant crap.
I was not suspended for my actions, but the fallout amongst the faculty was immense. Teachers actually came to me in the halls asking if I felt that way, then why I did I turn in the document in the first place? I told them it was something that needed to be said.
This young man did the same. And while I wouldn't classify him a "hero" (hero worship is another form of slavery), I can certainly understand what he did, and applaud it.
The audacity of the school to suspend him is amazing, particularly knowing as they must have that this incident would recieve wide reportage. Of course, that doesn't make the kid any less suspended.....
Yes, I know Lawson's in reality bought the hardware, but does it strike anyone as odd that Japan is considered "cool" just because IBM figured out a way to SELL a FREE operating system to a mass-retailer?
Though I doubt many Japanese will weigh into this discussion, I'm curious: as you sleep in your 4X6 cubicles, pounding on your PS2s, do you feel cool? Or just cramped?
This may sound callous, but I didn't think too much of these stories when they came out, nor do I now.
Even when I graduated from high school nearly two decades ago, the stories related in the series were as old then as they are now. High school is universally degrading, and it's not meant to be anything MORE than that. The last four years of your indoctrination are repeats of the first eight; the only reason they exist is to make sure you're properly oriented for the society you're going to be a wage slave in. That the Columbine kids took matters into their own hands is either a testament to their ability to resist Control (at the sake of their own self-control and eternal souls) or a condemnation that the indoctrination of the school systems isn't as complete as it needs to be to turn everyone into a Good Citizen.
Of course, no child knows this while they're going through it, and the State tries its level best to keep you in the dark.
(I can already hear the cries of protest about this viewpoint. To these people I ask this: in all honesty, how much of what you now know did you learn in high school? For that matter, how much out of COLLEGE? The point is this: "education" in its modern incarnation is created to limit thought, not expand it. Worse, it's ultimate goal appears to be to mold frames of thought such that certain viewpoints are literally impossible to attain.)
Don't kid yourselves now that you're IPO millionaires that anything has really changed. You're every bit a part of the Machine now that the "Jocks" represented in high school; it's only the roles that have reversed: you're on the upper level looking down at the McDonald employee who is so lazy and contemptibly lacking in ambition: S/HE, regardless of their glories in high school, is now the "weirdo" and you the "jock".
Freedom is not about one's ability to play Quake or D&D free from ridicule. It's about understanding the system of control the Iron Prison has created and how to overcome it. I haven't figured it out yet, but like the man emerging from the Cave, I now know that the shadows are just that, and can see them for what they are.
Maybe those kids SHOULD take a break from Quake and look around. Young or old, it's the same bowel of boogers for all of us. Even the "jocks".
I shouldn't complain as I did not send any questions in (I already had the answers to my questions), but I have to say that more than a couple of those questions were stinkers.
The particularly smelly one, though, was the "mission" one. The very premise that America HAS a mission is itself a false one: this country, like that of it's father, the UK, is based on the principle of wealth accumulation and manipulation by the powerful. In other words, the US is just like any other nation state you'd care to name; it's just been incredibly successful at its real purpose.
Don't look to the government or a geographical location for the meaning that is absent in your life; look within yourself. Once you do that, I wager you'll see these "missions" for what they really are and realize how little they speak to the "values" professed by those who pride themselves on being "American".
The truth is, technology and politics are no longer separable. Almost every citizen, from the hapless buyer trying to get tech support to the parent eliminating a potentially retarded embryo has to deal with technology, even though we don't have any national philosophy of technology and it almost never surfaces directly as an issue in our political system.
Jon, the anarchists (Zerzan and the Unabomber being only the latest examples) have known this "revelation" for over a century.
Whether the folks here want to admit it or not, technology by its very nature perpetuates the class systems that have ruled humanity since the first Sumerian bean counter decided it would be cool to charge rent for grain storage.
The question of whether politics and technology are separable can only be raised by someone who categorically refuses to understand the effects of their life here on Gaia. The person of which you spoke is such an individual, and if he is, as you imply, representative of the sector I work in--and I fear that he is--then I *need* to find another line of work.
This is totally off topic, but I wanted to respond to what FallLine said.
What is that supposed to mean? I said the events in South America are largely extraneous. In other words, it neither contributes nor takes away from the notion that the United States has an extremely stable goverment.
They are not extraneous. The stability of the US government DEPENDS on keeping foreign people's under its boot. If those countries were not exposed to the neo-liberal policies of the US which--like the British Empire in India--GUARANTEE a market for their company's goods, your "stability" goes bye-bye. The US did this with the Philippines, Hawaii, Guatemala, the list goes on and on. Here, inside the Plastic Bubble, things look and feel great (comparatively), and these aggressions are justified, in Orwellian fashion, as "defending democracy" and "enhancing stability". The question is: stability for whom? The obvious answer is: US, and us alone.
Like all imperialistic states, the US is a predator, and it chooses the weakest of enemies to pick on or exploit. THAT is what makes this country stable--the combination of US force of arms and the willingness to use them against defeated/weaker opponents (the Bomb in Japan and depleted uranium shells in Iraq), and the corresponding largesse its economic policies (armed extortion) lavishes on its own populace. If you believe otherwise, congratulations, you're the perfect US citizen.
This brings to my mind the best--and most chilling--line of "Three Days of the Condor" was when Cliff Robertson said, "Do you think they'll ask us THEN? No, they'll just want us to get it for them." That was as true in the 70s as it is today.
I'm not trying to be a smart-ass or put you down or anything, but you really need to start thinking outside of the box the American Intelligensia has fostered on you.
I admit, the US screwed over much of South and Latin America. However, the fact of the matter is that we didn't do it for shits and grins; we were fighting the Cold War. It was serious business, despite the revisionist history of some recent historians.
This is apology for atrocity, not a testament to American stability. The REASON you've got it so fine is BECAUSE of those "mistakes" made in the Cold War. I suppose you believe that dropping the Bomb on Japan was justified, too.
All of which puts the lie into Katz's view of the Internet as savior. Yes, people talk here, but they act and think as they always did.
Excuse me, I need to go to the coffee machine.....
Yes, I read the article, and it did not refer to NT; you're correct.
However, it definitely referred to Outlook, which generally runs on NT or WinXX, and therein lies the problem.
Now, you can claim that users are at fault for events like these, but isn't part of software engineering and design to make software that is not only user friendly, but protects users from making errors that would comprimise their systems?
Case in point: OpenBSD. It takes a MINIMALIST approach in its design philosophy so that it prevents a luser's accidental comprimising of the system/network. Yes, you can make it vulnerable, BUT NOT BY JUST USING THE SOFTWARE; it takes a conscious effort on the user's part to make it open.
Outlook, and the system it rests on top of, does NOT have this design philosophy. Quite the contrary, as "market driven" products, issues such system security and program integrity take a backseat to "interface usability" and "feature set".
The enduser should only be blamed on the failed integrity of their system to the degree that they actively seek to comprimise it. And since this "attack" wasn't a StickyNote Exploit, I think it's perfectly fare to dis the system that created the situation.
This was PRECISELY my first thought when I read these pieces: this is a staged event for some reason as yet to be revealed.
Of course, as a reluctant user of NT, I *know* it's vulnerable, and the fact this occured doesn't surprise me at all. What IS surprising is we haven't heard more of this coming out of Redmond; it can't be the first time.
I don't think the possibility that this is a way for Microsoft to reign in the Open Source movement is paranoid AT ALL. With M$ having its market share threatened by Open Source stuff, why not create an excuse that the people releasing it are ripping off internal code stolen from M$. Indeed, it makes perfect sense, and it wouldn't surprise me if the lawsuits start flying within 6 months.
I worked at a place where we had REAL break-ins, and the last thing you want to tell your customers is that you've been hacked. The fact that M$ is being so forthright about this--in direct contradiction to the way they typically stonewall against any less-than-flattering news--points to an entirely different motivation than just being honest.
Remember, the people that report these stories have extensive relationships with M$. There can be no doubt that they are spinning this is such a way as to ultimately benefit M$, or any initiative that M$ may find to its liking.
By the wall, Randall is *NOT* a criminal. Yes, he was convicted, but that means about as much as the stain on Monica's dress. Judge for yourself; go here for more information.
I've been approached by a private investigator reciently. Someone on disability appears to be running a buisness from his house, the invistigator wants to know if I can break into his comptuer and collect evidence.
Note that I have not aggreed to the above, and will not until I get more information. However we can all agree that IF fraud is committed the evidence I collect would be honest, but if not I would be stepping over the line.
THIS is Big Brother speaking. This is why we live in a post-Orwell, Kafkaesque world: people are more than willing, with little knowledge or explanation, to spy on, covertly investigate, and violate their neighbors personal space, all in the name of some amorphous Good of which they themselves have yet to question the real value.
This is not heroism, it's not even being a good citizen; it's the Lockstep Dance of the Man. This THOUGHT, the possibility of action on the behalf of heresay, ostensibly in service to the common good, provides perfect evidence as to why these legislations are so successful: people, even some with "moral" qualms, do not question the underlying principles these laws try to cover in shotgun fashion, and simply do as they're told.
This is how corporations ruin the environment; this is how Drug Wars happen. People with good intentions--usually on behalf of the State or the Shareholder--work and interact with others in ways that are at best morally dubious and at worst indefensible.
Real social engineering is what is required for issues like this to change. Unfortunately, as this post graphically shows, many of those "in the know" are ALSO in need of the same paradigm shift required by the Great Unwashed to prevent silliness like this from even being considered.
The bright side is, though, you're prime hiring fodder for the CIA.
RMS has a position that he believes in and lives by. He would like you to accept it, but freely acknowledges that you may not. He exercises *his* freedom to call you immoral, and you, in turn, exercise your right to call him such.
The major difference between you is that you do it with acrimony and RMS does it from a philosophical standpoint.
Don't curse the man because you refuse to understand his viewpoint. If you don't want to use or support Free Software, don't. There's lots of Open Software out there to make you feel warm and fuzzy as you drink your Starbucks.
This is NOT a radical proposal; it's the most reasonable idea I've seen yet.
David Brin's view, as expressed in The Transparent Society, was precisely this: the People need to watch the Watchers, and be every bit as vigilant as the Government is in their surveillence of us. Not surprisingly, the Government doesn't see it this way, even though our tax dollars pay for the very equipment they use to catalog us like so many butterfly.
_rant_
Anyone who unilaterally defends our abilities to question the omnipresent government eye will either be branded a terrorist or a child molester, or both, and will summarily be dismissed, if not imprisoned. (Look how they turned Mitnick: no more frightening example of the power of the Big Stick can be found in recent reportage than his advocacy of the government DB.) This pretty much rules out the "democratic process", leaving us to fend for ourselves. That's why Freenet and such is not only important, but necessary: it exists outside of the limited mindscapes of Those Above.
_end rant_
Why can't we see what the Watchers see? This is more than a rhetorical question; it's becoming a fundamental issue of our existence.
While I know Brin's disavowing this as rant as an off-the-cuff polemic, it saddens me nonetheless that yet another American intellectual posits the superiority of this system as the End of History and the Envy of Billions.
The US is a police state--unless you're a member of the class Brin represents, whereas it's only a capitalist republic. The two don't rule each other out, of course, and the lazy millions that are uninterested or incapable of climbing the plateau to Millionairehood would probably be able to articulate this maxim to Brin if given the opportunity.
I really LIKED Transparent Society, and of course his Uplifter series. Sadly, I feel this fondness has been misplaced--he's just another White American Intellectual. See Chomsky for what that means.
(Brin isn't alone, either: Bear's Darwin's Radio reflects the class prejudices of its author, as well, and I'm really struggling to make it through it. Bear's another smart guy mired in his little Clockwork World. A little Zerzan would do these fellows some good.....)
Now, Gore and Nader both subscribe to what can be loosely described as 'liberal' policies.
That just might be the most clueless statement I've ever heard. You apparently have no idea WHAT a liberal is.
Ronald Reagan was a liberal; all the free market pukes have been liberals. These policies are called neo-liberalism for a REASON. Free marketeers need a SOCIALLY conservative (fascist) state within which to run their show. Their economics, on the other hand, are all about liberalism, and have been since Adam Smith.
Gore and Bush are identical. Just because they differ on non-issues like abortion (remember, only the already living support abortion!) doesn't mean they're not cut from the same cloth. The fact that the Gun Rack crowd here is trotting out the Communist epithet against Nader means that he's different; he is certainly NOT a liberal in the Rush Limbaugh-sense of the word.
Please watch your "loosely described" references. Not only are they colloquial; they're wrong.
There are most likely quite a few people at the university who are shareholders in tech stocks, particularly those dealing with OSes and hardware. In that context, it's actually quite a clever move--for them.
The students? They're just meat to be ground into the system. Might as well shake them down (or, in the case of the subsidized boxes, the Public) for more cash as they're processed through the system.
Is he the biggest moron, ever, to run for president of the United States?
Gore Vidal pretty much thinks so, as does just about every person I talk to. When he's not LITERALLY picking his nose in public (I WISH I had the link to the RealVideo real of him digging away), he's mumbling and bumbling his way through speeches designed for monosyllabic ease.
Isn't anyone afraid--not too mention EMBARESSED--that this wealthy idiot son is one step away from having the Button under his butterfingers?
His dad was a puker, and he's a picker: America--love it or leave it?
Here is a link about how good, upstanding Americans experimented with others "less than themselves". You'll notice that the time frame is similar to the Nazis; one of the dirty little secrets about the eugenics belief system--one which you, Anonymous Moral Coward, seemingly defend--is that it was HIGHLY popular outside the Goosestepping set.
For more info about experimentation on less than willing subjects, go here.
While that's a nice sentiment, I REALLY see no social change on the horizon, whether today's "youth" (the market segment I left not so long ago) takes power or not.
Look at the 60s: when the youth movement got any power, THE power flooded the movement with drugs (CIA) or murdered the leaders outright (FBI). By the time that generation realized what had happened, they were so busy buying up espresso makers and pitching Jordache jeans that they're concerns about their Social Security benefits now blot out "youthful indescretions" about changing the existing social structure. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
The point is: the longer within the system you remain, the less likely you are to change it.
Sorry to be so grim; this whole issue of social change (REAL change, not just faster microprocessors) has me just as confused, chagrined and alarmed as you. And, like you, I have no ready answer to solve the problem....
I'm happy for your blue-eyed, blonde-haired Aryan offspring; I'm sure they'll make the world a better place (just as they did 60 years ago.)
As for genetic manipulation, all we've seen so far is a proliferation of dog-types; I'd hardly call that a ringing endorsement for your cook-the-genes positivism.
Finally, what is this obsession with the human race's "potential"? I personally don't give a shit whether or not the species survives--I'm not at all certain it should. If nothing else, genetic manipulation will CHANGE the species, anyway, and humanity WILL go the way of the dinosaurs.
Really, what makes you think you're genetic super child will do anything more than put your sorry ass into a concentration camp?
You're depending on "presumption of innocense" in a place that has very different laws--and corresponding concepts thereof--than here.
Think of it like this: if you don't take the test, the burden is then on you to prove you're healthy. Since insurance isn't a legal system, you have no ability to defend your right to refuse such a test. Hence, using the logic of "only the guilty have something to hide", you're a disease-ridden, high insurance risk, unworthy of any coverage whatsoever. They'll smile, put a black mark against your name in their DB, and look for reasons to drop you. The other providers that they share your info with will already have more than enough reason to deny you coverage when you seek THEIR help.
It's highly unlikely that someone just bopping in here is going to stay with NT because of any impression garnered here about RH or linux in general. (Believe it or not,/. is just NOT that powerful.)
Secondly, any perusing done here reveals the common knowledge that RH x.0 releases are unstable, and are generally stabilized quickly.
Finally, people are NOT picking on RH. If linux advocates hold their operating system to a standard higher than M$ products, then it is only appropriate to pillory a linux company that distributes a faulty version of the operating system. RH does this almost regularly, and SHOULD get some heat about it.
First of all, "we" won't be incinerated by the sun for at LEAST a couple of BILLION years. I feel relatively safe on that count.
As for the worker revolt at the current level of technology, if the tech was actually spread UNIVERSALLY to every human on this planet, you'd find many billions better off than they are now, which is hardly stagnation. (Though, it could also be argued that this form of democraticization of technology would burn out this mudball far quicker than the sun will.)
Your most interesting point, however, is the presumption that the human species should LAST millions of years. I certainly hope that is not the case; THAT form of stagnation is the most hellish vision I can contemplate.
Morality is a flexible thing, and can be applied to software piracy only by those with a vested interest in the object in question.
Software piracy is not moral or immoral; it is amoral. Comparing theft of property to the copying of a copy is at best specious. I do not feel the least bit conflicted when the opportunity presents itself.
I suppose that makes me a bad person, but, as a tax-paying citizen, I'm already responsible for the deaths of thousands, so I'll just live with it.
Right here, right now, we have a virtual community.
/. is a classic community. It's filled with people who all think alike--and believe others should think exactly like them. Like all communities, those who don't follow along (you know, the stupid ones) or the ones that can't follow along (you know, those peasants getting sprayed in Columbia) are naturally excluded. There's no elitism in this; it's just how things are.
And that's how/. *likes* it. The white guys can speak for the colored ones, the rich ones for the poor ones, the smart for the stupid, and it's all framed in this nice, civilized interface so the community can debate its own merits without its members changing in any real way.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't agree.
When I was in school, in order to make the National Honor Society, we had to make a case for our acceptance into that august organization over and above our gradepoint average. I took the opportunity to tell them that I rejected their silly contest as elitist beauty pageant crap.
I was not suspended for my actions, but the fallout amongst the faculty was immense. Teachers actually came to me in the halls asking if I felt that way, then why I did I turn in the document in the first place? I told them it was something that needed to be said.
This young man did the same. And while I wouldn't classify him a "hero" (hero worship is another form of slavery), I can certainly understand what he did, and applaud it.
The audacity of the school to suspend him is amazing, particularly knowing as they must have that this incident would recieve wide reportage. Of course, that doesn't make the kid any less suspended.....
Yes, I know Lawson's in reality bought the hardware, but does it strike anyone as odd that Japan is considered "cool" just because IBM figured out a way to SELL a FREE operating system to a mass-retailer?
Though I doubt many Japanese will weigh into this discussion, I'm curious: as you sleep in your 4X6 cubicles, pounding on your PS2s, do you feel cool? Or just cramped?
This may sound callous, but I didn't think too much of these stories when they came out, nor do I now.
Even when I graduated from high school nearly two decades ago, the stories related in the series were as old then as they are now. High school is universally degrading, and it's not meant to be anything MORE than that. The last four years of your indoctrination are repeats of the first eight; the only reason they exist is to make sure you're properly oriented for the society you're going to be a wage slave in. That the Columbine kids took matters into their own hands is either a testament to their ability to resist Control (at the sake of their own self-control and eternal souls) or a condemnation that the indoctrination of the school systems isn't as complete as it needs to be to turn everyone into a Good Citizen.
Of course, no child knows this while they're going through it, and the State tries its level best to keep you in the dark.
(I can already hear the cries of protest about this viewpoint. To these people I ask this: in all honesty, how much of what you now know did you learn in high school? For that matter, how much out of COLLEGE? The point is this: "education" in its modern incarnation is created to limit thought, not expand it. Worse, it's ultimate goal appears to be to mold frames of thought such that certain viewpoints are literally impossible to attain.)
Don't kid yourselves now that you're IPO millionaires that anything has really changed. You're every bit a part of the Machine now that the "Jocks" represented in high school; it's only the roles that have reversed: you're on the upper level looking down at the McDonald employee who is so lazy and contemptibly lacking in ambition: S/HE, regardless of their glories in high school, is now the "weirdo" and you the "jock".
Freedom is not about one's ability to play Quake or D&D free from ridicule. It's about understanding the system of control the Iron Prison has created and how to overcome it. I haven't figured it out yet, but like the man emerging from the Cave, I now know that the shadows are just that, and can see them for what they are.
Maybe those kids SHOULD take a break from Quake and look around. Young or old, it's the same bowel of boogers for all of us. Even the "jocks".
I shouldn't complain as I did not send any questions in (I already had the answers to my questions), but I have to say that more than a couple of those questions were stinkers.
The particularly smelly one, though, was the "mission" one. The very premise that America HAS a mission is itself a false one: this country, like that of it's father, the UK, is based on the principle of wealth accumulation and manipulation by the powerful. In other words, the US is just like any other nation state you'd care to name; it's just been incredibly successful at its real purpose.
Don't look to the government or a geographical location for the meaning that is absent in your life; look within yourself. Once you do that, I wager you'll see these "missions" for what they really are and realize how little they speak to the "values" professed by those who pride themselves on being "American".
Patriotism: just say no.
The truth is, technology and politics are no longer separable. Almost every citizen, from the hapless buyer trying to get tech support to the parent eliminating a potentially retarded embryo has to deal with technology, even though we don't have any national philosophy of technology and it almost never surfaces directly as an issue in our political system.
Jon, the anarchists (Zerzan and the Unabomber being only the latest examples) have known this "revelation" for over a century.
Whether the folks here want to admit it or not, technology by its very nature perpetuates the class systems that have ruled humanity since the first Sumerian bean counter decided it would be cool to charge rent for grain storage.
The question of whether politics and technology are separable can only be raised by someone who categorically refuses to understand the effects of their life here on Gaia. The person of which you spoke is such an individual, and if he is, as you imply, representative of the sector I work in--and I fear that he is--then I *need* to find another line of work.
This is totally off topic, but I wanted to respond to what FallLine said.
What is that supposed to mean? I said the events in South America are largely extraneous. In other words, it neither contributes nor takes away from the notion that the United States has an extremely stable goverment.
They are not extraneous. The stability of the US government DEPENDS on keeping foreign people's under its boot. If those countries were not exposed to the neo-liberal policies of the US which--like the British Empire in India--GUARANTEE a market for their company's goods, your "stability" goes bye-bye. The US did this with the Philippines, Hawaii, Guatemala, the list goes on and on. Here, inside the Plastic Bubble, things look and feel great (comparatively), and these aggressions are justified, in Orwellian fashion, as "defending democracy" and "enhancing stability". The question is: stability for whom? The obvious answer is: US, and us alone.
Like all imperialistic states, the US is a predator, and it chooses the weakest of enemies to pick on or exploit. THAT is what makes this country stable--the combination of US force of arms and the willingness to use them against defeated/weaker opponents (the Bomb in Japan and depleted uranium shells in Iraq), and the corresponding largesse its economic policies (armed extortion) lavishes on its own populace. If you believe otherwise, congratulations, you're the perfect US citizen.
This brings to my mind the best--and most chilling--line of "Three Days of the Condor" was when Cliff Robertson said, "Do you think they'll ask us THEN? No, they'll just want us to get it for them." That was as true in the 70s as it is today.
I'm not trying to be a smart-ass or put you down or anything, but you really need to start thinking outside of the box the American Intelligensia has fostered on you.
Again, pardon the off-topic post.
I admit, the US screwed over much of South and Latin America. However, the fact of the matter is that we didn't do it for shits and grins; we were fighting the Cold War. It was serious business, despite the revisionist history of some recent historians.
This is apology for atrocity, not a testament to American stability. The REASON you've got it so fine is BECAUSE of those "mistakes" made in the Cold War. I suppose you believe that dropping the Bomb on Japan was justified, too.
All of which puts the lie into Katz's view of the Internet as savior. Yes, people talk here, but they act and think as they always did.
Excuse me, I need to go to the coffee machine.....
Yes, I read the article, and it did not refer to NT; you're correct.
However, it definitely referred to Outlook, which generally runs on NT or WinXX, and therein lies the problem.
Now, you can claim that users are at fault for events like these, but isn't part of software engineering and design to make software that is not only user friendly, but protects users from making errors that would comprimise their systems?
Case in point: OpenBSD. It takes a MINIMALIST approach in its design philosophy so that it prevents a luser's accidental comprimising of the system/network. Yes, you can make it vulnerable, BUT NOT BY JUST USING THE SOFTWARE; it takes a conscious effort on the user's part to make it open.
Outlook, and the system it rests on top of, does NOT have this design philosophy. Quite the contrary, as "market driven" products, issues such system security and program integrity take a backseat to "interface usability" and "feature set".
The enduser should only be blamed on the failed integrity of their system to the degree that they actively seek to comprimise it. And since this "attack" wasn't a StickyNote Exploit, I think it's perfectly fare to dis the system that created the situation.
This was PRECISELY my first thought when I read these pieces: this is a staged event for some reason as yet to be revealed.
Of course, as a reluctant user of NT, I *know* it's vulnerable, and the fact this occured doesn't surprise me at all. What IS surprising is we haven't heard more of this coming out of Redmond; it can't be the first time.
I don't think the possibility that this is a way for Microsoft to reign in the Open Source movement is paranoid AT ALL. With M$ having its market share threatened by Open Source stuff, why not create an excuse that the people releasing it are ripping off internal code stolen from M$. Indeed, it makes perfect sense, and it wouldn't surprise me if the lawsuits start flying within 6 months.
I worked at a place where we had REAL break-ins, and the last thing you want to tell your customers is that you've been hacked. The fact that M$ is being so forthright about this--in direct contradiction to the way they typically stonewall against any less-than-flattering news--points to an entirely different motivation than just being honest.
Remember, the people that report these stories have extensive relationships with M$. There can be no doubt that they are spinning this is such a way as to ultimately benefit M$, or any initiative that M$ may find to its liking.
By the wall, Randall is *NOT* a criminal. Yes, he was convicted, but that means about as much as the stain on Monica's dress. Judge for yourself; go here for more information.
I've been approached by a private investigator reciently. Someone on disability appears to be running a buisness from his house, the invistigator wants to know if I can break into his comptuer and collect evidence.
Note that I have not aggreed to the above, and will not until I get more information. However we can all agree that IF fraud is committed the evidence I collect would be honest, but if not I would be stepping over the line.
THIS is Big Brother speaking. This is why we live in a post-Orwell, Kafkaesque world: people are more than willing, with little knowledge or explanation, to spy on, covertly investigate, and violate their neighbors personal space, all in the name of some amorphous Good of which they themselves have yet to question the real value.
This is not heroism, it's not even being a good citizen; it's the Lockstep Dance of the Man. This THOUGHT, the possibility of action on the behalf of heresay, ostensibly in service to the common good, provides perfect evidence as to why these legislations are so successful: people, even some with "moral" qualms, do not question the underlying principles these laws try to cover in shotgun fashion, and simply do as they're told.
This is how corporations ruin the environment; this is how Drug Wars happen. People with good intentions--usually on behalf of the State or the Shareholder--work and interact with others in ways that are at best morally dubious and at worst indefensible.
Real social engineering is what is required for issues like this to change. Unfortunately, as this post graphically shows, many of those "in the know" are ALSO in need of the same paradigm shift required by the Great Unwashed to prevent silliness like this from even being considered.
The bright side is, though, you're prime hiring fodder for the CIA.
You obviously don't get it.
RMS has a position that he believes in and lives by. He would like you to accept it, but freely acknowledges that you may not. He exercises *his* freedom to call you immoral, and you, in turn, exercise your right to call him such.
The major difference between you is that you do it with acrimony and RMS does it from a philosophical standpoint.
Don't curse the man because you refuse to understand his viewpoint. If you don't want to use or support Free Software, don't. There's lots of Open Software out there to make you feel warm and fuzzy as you drink your Starbucks.
This is truly a non-issue.
It's like arguing that cars minted after the first four-wheelers are not horseless carriages.
They are, and it doesn't matter. We still use them.
This is NOT a radical proposal; it's the most reasonable idea I've seen yet.
David Brin's view, as expressed in The Transparent Society, was precisely this: the People need to watch the Watchers, and be every bit as vigilant as the Government is in their surveillence of us. Not surprisingly, the Government doesn't see it this way, even though our tax dollars pay for the very equipment they use to catalog us like so many butterfly.
_rant_
Anyone who unilaterally defends our abilities to question the omnipresent government eye will either be branded a terrorist or a child molester, or both, and will summarily be dismissed, if not imprisoned. (Look how they turned Mitnick: no more frightening example of the power of the Big Stick can be found in recent reportage than his advocacy of the government DB.) This pretty much rules out the "democratic process", leaving us to fend for ourselves. That's why Freenet and such is not only important, but necessary: it exists outside of the limited mindscapes of Those Above.
_end rant_
Why can't we see what the Watchers see? This is more than a rhetorical question; it's becoming a fundamental issue of our existence.
While I know Brin's disavowing this as rant as an off-the-cuff polemic, it saddens me nonetheless that yet another American intellectual posits the superiority of this system as the End of History and the Envy of Billions.
The US is a police state--unless you're a member of the class Brin represents, whereas it's only a capitalist republic. The two don't rule each other out, of course, and the lazy millions that are uninterested or incapable of climbing the plateau to Millionairehood would probably be able to articulate this maxim to Brin if given the opportunity.
I really LIKED Transparent Society, and of course his Uplifter series. Sadly, I feel this fondness has been misplaced--he's just another White American Intellectual. See Chomsky for what that means.
(Brin isn't alone, either: Bear's Darwin's Radio reflects the class prejudices of its author, as well, and I'm really struggling to make it through it. Bear's another smart guy mired in his little Clockwork World. A little Zerzan would do these fellows some good.....)
Now, Gore and Nader both subscribe to what can be loosely described as 'liberal' policies.
That just might be the most clueless statement I've ever heard. You apparently have no idea WHAT a liberal is.
Ronald Reagan was a liberal; all the free market pukes have been liberals. These policies are called neo-liberalism for a REASON. Free marketeers need a SOCIALLY conservative (fascist) state within which to run their show. Their economics, on the other hand, are all about liberalism, and have been since Adam Smith.
Gore and Bush are identical. Just because they differ on non-issues like abortion (remember, only the already living support abortion!) doesn't mean they're not cut from the same cloth. The fact that the Gun Rack crowd here is trotting out the Communist epithet against Nader means that he's different; he is certainly NOT a liberal in the Rush Limbaugh-sense of the word.
Please watch your "loosely described" references. Not only are they colloquial; they're wrong.
I'm not so sure it's a stupid idea.
There are most likely quite a few people at the university who are shareholders in tech stocks, particularly those dealing with OSes and hardware. In that context, it's actually quite a clever move--for them.
The students? They're just meat to be ground into the system. Might as well shake them down (or, in the case of the subsidized boxes, the Public) for more cash as they're processed through the system.
Is he the biggest moron, ever, to run for president of the United States?
Gore Vidal pretty much thinks so, as does just about every person I talk to. When he's not LITERALLY picking his nose in public (I WISH I had the link to the RealVideo real of him digging away), he's mumbling and bumbling his way through speeches designed for monosyllabic ease.
Isn't anyone afraid--not too mention EMBARESSED--that this wealthy idiot son is one step away from having the Button under his butterfingers?
His dad was a puker, and he's a picker: America--love it or leave it?
Uhh, who said anything about the Nazis?
Here is a link about how good, upstanding Americans experimented with others "less than themselves". You'll notice that the time frame is similar to the Nazis; one of the dirty little secrets about the eugenics belief system--one which you, Anonymous Moral Coward, seemingly defend--is that it was HIGHLY popular outside the Goosestepping set.
For more info about experimentation on less than willing subjects, go here.
While that's a nice sentiment, I REALLY see no social change on the horizon, whether today's "youth" (the market segment I left not so long ago) takes power or not.
Look at the 60s: when the youth movement got any power, THE power flooded the movement with drugs (CIA) or murdered the leaders outright (FBI). By the time that generation realized what had happened, they were so busy buying up espresso makers and pitching Jordache jeans that they're concerns about their Social Security benefits now blot out "youthful indescretions" about changing the existing social structure. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
The point is: the longer within the system you remain, the less likely you are to change it.
Sorry to be so grim; this whole issue of social change (REAL change, not just faster microprocessors) has me just as confused, chagrined and alarmed as you. And, like you, I have no ready answer to solve the problem....
I'm happy for your blue-eyed, blonde-haired Aryan offspring; I'm sure they'll make the world a better place (just as they did 60 years ago.)
As for genetic manipulation, all we've seen so far is a proliferation of dog-types; I'd hardly call that a ringing endorsement for your cook-the-genes positivism.
Finally, what is this obsession with the human race's "potential"? I personally don't give a shit whether or not the species survives--I'm not at all certain it should. If nothing else, genetic manipulation will CHANGE the species, anyway, and humanity WILL go the way of the dinosaurs.
Really, what makes you think you're genetic super child will do anything more than put your sorry ass into a concentration camp?
You're depending on "presumption of innocense" in a place that has very different laws--and corresponding concepts thereof--than here.
Think of it like this: if you don't take the test, the burden is then on you to prove you're healthy. Since insurance isn't a legal system, you have no ability to defend your right to refuse such a test. Hence, using the logic of "only the guilty have something to hide", you're a disease-ridden, high insurance risk, unworthy of any coverage whatsoever. They'll smile, put a black mark against your name in their DB, and look for reasons to drop you. The other providers that they share your info with will already have more than enough reason to deny you coverage when you seek THEIR help.
This is a lose-lose situation.
You're over-reacting.
/. is just NOT that powerful.)
It's highly unlikely that someone just bopping in here is going to stay with NT because of any impression garnered here about RH or linux in general. (Believe it or not,
Secondly, any perusing done here reveals the common knowledge that RH x.0 releases are unstable, and are generally stabilized quickly.
Finally, people are NOT picking on RH. If linux advocates hold their operating system to a standard higher than M$ products, then it is only appropriate to pillory a linux company that distributes a faulty version of the operating system. RH does this almost regularly, and SHOULD get some heat about it.
First of all, "we" won't be incinerated by the sun for at LEAST a couple of BILLION years. I feel relatively safe on that count.
As for the worker revolt at the current level of technology, if the tech was actually spread UNIVERSALLY to every human on this planet, you'd find many billions better off than they are now, which is hardly stagnation. (Though, it could also be argued that this form of democraticization of technology would burn out this mudball far quicker than the sun will.)
Your most interesting point, however, is the presumption that the human species should LAST millions of years. I certainly hope that is not the case; THAT form of stagnation is the most hellish vision I can contemplate.
Morality is a flexible thing, and can be applied to software piracy only by those with a vested interest in the object in question.
Software piracy is not moral or immoral; it is amoral. Comparing theft of property to the copying of a copy is at best specious. I do not feel the least bit conflicted when the opportunity presents itself.
I suppose that makes me a bad person, but, as a tax-paying citizen, I'm already responsible for the deaths of thousands, so I'll just live with it.
Right here, right now, we have a virtual community.
/. *likes* it. The white guys can speak for the colored ones, the rich ones for the poor ones, the smart for the stupid, and it's all framed in this nice, civilized interface so the community can debate its own merits without its members changing in any real way.
/. is a classic community. It's filled with people who all think alike--and believe others should think exactly like them. Like all communities, those who don't follow along (you know, the stupid ones) or the ones that can't follow along (you know, those peasants getting sprayed in Columbia) are naturally excluded. There's no elitism in this; it's just how things are.
And that's how
Just like the real world......